Tears spilled down Ned’s cheeks as she stared at the air where her mother had been. At her feet, the Decree of the Deceased that had just been burned to pieces reformed itself anew. There wasn’t so much as a scorch-mark. ‘Mam,’ she cried, lifting the decree into her hands again. ‘Mammy. You can do it. You’re strong as an ox and canny as an alley cat. Mean as one, too.’ She laughed sadly. ‘I am the invoker. Our contract must be honoured. Come through to us, now. Please, Mammy. Please.’

  There was a moment of strange silence, the kind of quiet that gave me the shivers. Whispers followed the silence, invading the room, and I huddled close to Cullen, not minding when his arm encircled my shoulder and pulled me even closer. In my arms, Cleo’s small body was shaking, and I stroked her to keep her calm.

  The whispering ceased, and the black candle-flames turned suddenly to smoke, swirling upwards. A cold wind invaded the room, swirling all around us; even Cullen, Cleo and I felt it, outside the circle though we were. The smoke coalesced, concentrating around one person only: Ned. We watched as it moved into her nose, her ears, her mouth, and lifted her from the ground and into the centre of the circle.

  She opened her mouth, and spoke in two voices: her own, and an older voice I knew must be her mother’s.

  ‘I cannot stay for long. Your sister has allies in the afterlife. They keep me from speaking to you, my darling daughter. They want you to think you have lost this battle, and that there is no point in fighting what you cannot beat. But you can beat the Old Ones, as long as you realise that this time, it cannot be just the Three. More people must fight along with you and the hunter and her mate. Look for the few people who still have their own minds, and let them help you.’ Ned dropped to the floor, her eyes closed as the smoke escaped her, whispering in her ear. It whispered for a long time, but we only heard the start, and it began by saying, ‘And now, my daughter, I give you my knowledge …’

  17. Bow to the Feline Overlord

  After a couple of attempts to listen to my messages, I put my useless phone down and concentrated on helping Cullen. We were back at the flat, getting some things together for our stay at the Cackler house. It was safer over there and we should be rushing back, but my stomach had rumbled as we started to pack, so now we were making some food. Well, Cullen was doing the making, while I assisted by fetching utensils and plates.

  As I helped him carry the sandwiches to the table, I couldn’t help but notice that Cleo was looking our way with a smirk on her face.

  ‘Why are you looking at us like that, kitty cat?’ wondered Cullen. ‘It’s weird.’

  Cleo looked my way. ‘You hear that, Katy? Your mate thinks I’m being weird.’

  I frowned. ‘My mate? Oh.’ Fluff it, anyway. I’d hoped no one noticed Ned’s mother’s reference to the hunter and her mate.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Cleo, laughing. ‘Your mate. Katy and Cullen, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g …’

  ‘If you want this piece of chicken,’ said Cullen, ‘then you’d best stop being such a catty kitty.’ He waved the slice of meat in her face and she pounced on it, chewing it before he could do a thing to stop her. ‘It’s all right,’ he murmured quietly, turning to me. ‘I know it was just a weird turn of phrase. Or maybe … maybe Ned’s mother meant mate like … a pal, a buddy.’

  ‘Sure,’ I agreed. ‘A chum. That’s what she meant.’

  ‘I wish Hamish were here,’ said Ned, giving me a useful interruption to my embarrassment as she threw her phone onto the table. ‘He’s a genius with stuff like this. He’d have our phones fixed in a jiffy.’

  Cleo shook her head. ‘It’s probably a good thing the dog isn’t here, considering what he said in the messages he left.’

  I didn’t want to admit that Cleo might be right. No matter what was going on with Hamish, he was our friend. Not having him around felt just plain wrong. So instead of replying to the cat I took a bite of my sandwich. It was all I could do to stop myself from groaning aloud. The last thing Cullen needed was another ego boost, but his sandwich-making skills were a thing of true genius. Never had a simple chicken sandwich tasted so good.

  ‘Well, either way, we can’t get any of the phones working,’ I said. ‘So I think we might have to go to Riddler’s Edge. I have some ideas, but they’ll only work with Eva and Felim’s help.’

  ‘We should all go,’ said Ned. ‘But not quite yet. I have to go out on the canal tonight – my mother wants me to start as soon as possible. And until I get used to it it’s gonna be hard to row and do the magic, so I was hoping you guys could help. Plus, you have that secret meeting with Hal at midnight.’

  I shivered. ‘I haven’t forgotten. The Cacklers said they’ll send some of their agents there too, under invisibility spells. We can do the canal straight after that. You know – if Hal hasn’t killed us all in a sneaky but brilliant manoeuvre.’

  ‘Doubt it,’ Cleo sniggered. ‘It is Hal. Now please, can somebody give me some water to go with this chicken?’

  I rubbed her head before she could protest and went to get drinks for everyone.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ Ned said as I handed her a glass of water. ‘About your uncle. I think first thing tomorrow we should spring him from Night and Gale. Then take him to Riddler’s Edge with us. He’ll be safer there.’

  ‘Safer?’ Cullen snorted. ‘You haven’t met Faster yet, Ned, but trust me. Wherever he is, he’s safe. It’s the witches around him we need to worry about.’

  Ned wrinkled her nose. ‘I don’t think so. Not now. I mean, I know you say that this Agent Müd is a good friend of yours, but he’s not your friend right now. No one is. You know this. The Wayfarers have been affected. Maybe the hospital staff, too. I know you say your uncle is under some kind of temporary amnesia right now, but by the sounds of the kind of power he has, that won’t last. What if someone hurts him, just to make sure that as a hunter he can’t do anything to stop the Old Ones?’

  I took a drink of water, wondering how best to explain my uncle. ‘Ned, I love my uncle. He’s the only father figure I’ve ever known. But he’s more likely to side with the Old Ones and the Warlock Society. In fact, if he found out about warlocks, he’d probably want to join their club.’ I drained my glass and stood up again, bringing my dishes to the sink. ‘But maybe for that reason alone I should go check up on him. Make sure that he can’t do any damage.’

  Cullen nodded. ‘That’s a plan. And while you guys do that tomorrow morning, I’ll head to Hopeless Hollow and have a word with Dolly and Clarissa. See who else we can get on board. We have to work fast. If they’re having a big party like the one that’s on tomorrow evening, then it’s probably so they can finalise their plans. Whatever they need to do to fully bring back the Old Ones, they’ll be doing it soon.’

  ‘Soon?’ Cleo shook her head in disdain. ‘Don’t pretend to be as thick as you look, Cullen. If they want Katy there with you tomorrow night, then they’re doing it tomorrow night.’ She looked at me with a macabre grin. ‘They probably want to sacrifice you to bring the demons back.’

  It was a thought that had already crossed my mind, so I ignored her and finished rinsing my dishes, placing them on the draining board before checking my watch. It wasn’t even ten. I thought I might take a nap for a couple of hours, because once we were done with Hal, and the canal, there wouldn’t be much time for sleep before the morning. The thought made me yawn. Life was far too exhausting lately. When all this was over (and presuming it didn’t end with my death) I was going to spend an entire week in bed, interspersed only by trips to the loo or calls for takeaway. I sighed to myself, thinking of all the TV I would watch, the books I would read, the burgers and curries I would eat …

  ‘What is wrong with you?’ asked Cleo, finishing off her chicken and setting her eyes on Ned’s unfinished sandwich. ‘We’re about to do battle with demons and you look like you haven’t a care in the world.’

  I pushed fantasies of blissful laziness away and snatched up Cleo’s empty dish. ‘Just imagining a better world,’ I said with a sigh. ‘I forgot I still lived in the one where sarcastic cats ruled my every move and thought.’

  ‘Well, you do,’ Cleo informed me proudly. ‘So bow to your feline overlord. All of you. Come on now. Bow low, people. Give me the worship I deserve.’

  Cullen grabbed his jacket and rolled his eyes. ‘Gonna have to give you a rain check on that one, Cleo. I told those warlocks I’d meet them at the Bank to discuss tomorrow’s party, so I’d better hop to it before they start to think I’m spending too much time with my latest conquest.’

  Ned stared his way. ‘The Bank? But I thought you were coming to stay at the Cackler house with us. Also … who are you calling your conquest? Because it had better not be Katy.’

  He rubbed his head awkwardly. ‘I would never call Katy my conquest. If I was ever lucky enough to actually go out with Katy, I’d call her my Queen.’ He turned his eyes to mine. ‘But right now I have to make a bunch of knuckle-draggers believe I don’t give a crap what happens to you tomorrow night. I’m going to tell them we spent a romantic afternoon together, and that you’re a gullible idiot who’d do absolutely anything I said. Look, I’ll slip back out of the Bank just before midnight and meet you guys then, okay?’

  He moved to the door, while I was still rooted to the spot. I couldn’t tell if Cullen had just made a romantic revelation or if he was being sarcastic. That was the problem with guys like Cullen. You never knew where you stood – which was precisely why, even if he did want me, I would never be dumb enough to be his girlfriend.

  So I simply said, ‘Bye then,’ as he turned the handle on the door. He hesitated, about to say something more, his eyes very much trying to make mine meet them. He had just begun with, ‘Katy, listen …’ when we heard banging from below.

  ‘That’s the front door,’ said Cleo with pricked ears and a swishing tail.

  ‘Magic yourself out of here,’ I told Cullen. ‘Then get to the Bank like you were going to. Me and Ned can deal with whoever it is.’

  ‘No way.’ He shook his head.

  ‘Yes way. Or do you think I’m too thick and gullible to look after myself?’

  There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before he clicked his fingers and vanished.

  18. As Cold as Ice

  We opened the door to find Eva standing there. ‘Oh, hello there,’ she began in a careful tone. ‘You must be Ned, Katy’s flatmate. I’m Katy’s Practical Wizardry professor, here to talk about college stuff.’

  Cleo laughed so hard she coughed up a hairball. ‘Sorry, lady,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you’re good at lots of things, but acting isn’t one of them. We know.’

  Eva looked questioningly at me and I nodded. ‘They do know everything now, it’s true.’ I squeezed Ned’s hand. ‘And thankfully we’re still friends.’

  ‘Oh, and I didn’t have anything to do with your mother’s disappearance,’ Ned added, holding the door wide so that Eva could enter. ‘But we’ve been talking to the Cacklers about that, and–’

  Eva shook her head frantically and pressed a finger against Ned’s lips, before hurrying us all up the stairs and into the flat in silence. Once there, she did a quick sweep of the room and gathered our phones into a bag. ‘Nearest window to the canal?’ she asked.

  I pointed to the window above the sink. Eva marched that way, opened the window, and hurled the phones out and into the water with an almighty splash. She turned back to us with a sheepish smile and said, ‘Sorry about that. But something’s stopping our phones from working properly, and it could also be monitoring us. My dad’s working on a communication system for us right now, but in the meantime it’s best to be careful.’

  ‘He’s stopped wolfing out?’ I grinned. ‘That’s great, because I have some plans in mind that I’ll need his help with.’

  Eva shifted uncomfortably. ‘Yeah, we can talk about that in a few minutes,’ she said. ‘First I need to show you guys how we’re being monitored through our phones. And um …’ She looked at her feet. ‘You’re not going to like it. Come on. We have to go to the college.’

  ≈

  As we stood staring around Hamish’s office at Wentforth’s, I felt perplexed. ‘I already searched here. You know that because you were here yourself.’

  ‘I know. But when I tried tracking spell after tracking spell and none would work, I tried something different.’ Eva pulled her wand from its place in her hair. ‘By the sounds of it, something shook Hamish to his core. He saw a woman on the street outside the Bank, he took off after her, and hasn’t been seen since. So I got to thinking – what was it about that woman? She was important. So … I did a Map Meld.’

  When Ned and Cleo looked confused, I recalled something I’d read in my wizarding studies. ‘It’s a complicated tracker spell. A wizard goes into a state of meditation and concentrates on the Outer Map, focusing on the last-known place that the person they’re searching for was seen.’

  ‘Exactly!’ Eva gave me a proud smile. ‘The thing with a Map Meld is that it doesn’t always give you the answers you think you’re looking for. The meditative state helps bring about the answers you actually need. Although I began by concentrating on Hamish’s last known location, I found my attention going to the spot on the map where this college is, and to the exact coordinates for Hamish’s office. The word revelation kept coming into my mind too, so I came here and, well … I did a revelation spell. With it, I was able to see every moment that Hamish has spent in this office recently.’

  Cleo laughed. ‘I’ll bet he spent an awful lot of time gnawing at his bum, didn’t he? Chasing his tail? Drooling? Somehow managing to surprise himself every time he farted?’

  ‘Actually,’ said Eva with no trace of mirth, ‘I didn’t need to go back far enough to see Hamish do much of anything. Because the last time he was here was the most significant moment of all. And I have an incantation that’ll bring us back to that precise moment, so that I can replay it for you all.’

  She waved her wand, saying, ‘See what passed here in this place

  When more than one did meet

  See what deals and deeds were done

  To bring danger to Samhain Street.’

  A scene began to play before us, and it was one that made me fear we’d already lost the war.

  ≈

  The door of the office opened, and Hamish staggered in, followed soon by Angelica and Bartholomew Shannon. There was a dazed look in Hamish’s eyes, and it was fighting with his expression of horror. ‘You cannae make me do this,’ he said in a dreamy voice. ‘You cannae make me do a thing I don’t want to do.’

  Bartholomew laughed and picked Hamish up, throwing him onto the couch. Angelica sat down next to Hamish, giving him a malicious grin. Her bag was glowing, but when she took something from it, I realised that it was it, and not the bag, that had cast the glow. It was a simple sphere, fitting easily into her palm, but it glowed so brightly that Hamish buried his face in a cushion.

  ‘You get used to it,’ said Angelica.

  ‘Mind you, you could have done more than gotten used to it,’ Bartholomew remarked, seating himself in Hamish’s desk chair and crossing his legs. ‘When we were done with it, we would have used it to make you a man again. All you had to do was become a proper member of the Not-So-Strange Society. But that stupid Katy Kramer had to keep on helping you resist.’

  Angelica let out a snort of derision. ‘That curly-haired cretin can’t help you now though, can she? Nobody can.’ Again, she reached into her handbag, this time pulling out a smaller paper bag. Opening it, she held it close to Hamish. ‘This is soil from behind my café. My garden is where the Old Ones were buried. The exact spot. Did you know that?’

  Hamish flinched, trying to move away from her as she pressed the bag into his face. He sneezed, then jumped across her, baring his teeth before saying, ‘I have no idea who the Old Ones are. You might have used some weird powers to hypnotise me and get me here, but I will not help you. I know you’re bad. I’m almost entirely dog these days, and we canines have a sense of these things.’

  Angelica arched a lovely blonde brow. ‘Bad? No, no, no. We’re not bad, Hamish. We’re trying to make a good world. A better world. What we’re doing is commendable. And if you help us now, we might make a place for you in it. We’ll treat you better than the weredogs. Maybe even better than the werewolves. We’ll let you work for us, with us. And after a few years of faithful service, we might let you use this to become a man again.’ She waved the glowing orb in the air.

  Hamish growled. ‘Whatever you have to offer, it isnae worth it.’

  With a long sigh, Angelica shook her head and said, ‘Fine. Have it your way.’ She pinned Hamish down, before moving the ball in precise motions in front of his eyes, drawing symbols in the air. Its light didn’t grow brighter, and Hamish only growled. ‘Stupid Ice Crystal!’ Angelica shrieked. ‘How come we can use it to draw power but we can’t use it to control minds the way he can?’ She glared at Bartholomew. ‘Well tell him to get a wriggle on then, will you? We need him to do his thing.’

  Bartholomew marched to the door and shouted out, ‘Kieran! Hurry up, will you?’

  Ned’s face paled, which was understandable. We could be about to see the Kieran – the hunter who had killed her mother and Minnie, and who had probably hurt my great aunt, too. But why was Eva just as pale as Ned?

  Finally, as Kieran walked in to the office, I understood her reaction. I’d seen the muscular blond man before, in photographs in the kitchen at Moonstone Farm. And in those pictures he’d been linking arms with his brother and sister. Kieran was a Moon. Aunt Jude’s own son, and the third triplet.

  ‘This better be important,’ he said with a snarl. ‘I was busy leaving a little message for my sister in her fancy new office.’