The Rain-Soaked Bride (30 page)

Don’t drive so fast!
she tried to tell herself.
Get back in control! Is that what you want to let him do to you? To turn you into this? To make you this weak?

She pressed down on the accelerator.

k) B49, Alcester, Warwickshire

Toby was flagging. Moving through the trees by the side of the road, he was aware that Fratfield and the curse he brought with him were closing in. As he stopped to catch his breath, Toby heard the sound of the rainfall hitting the undergrowth; fat, impossible raindrops beating out a rhythm on fallen winter leaves. In the end, they would catch up with him and then he would be too weak to defend himself. He had taken too much of a beating, his skin covered in wounds, his body bruised, to keep up the speed he needed in order to get ahead on foot.

He looked to the road as he heard the sound of a car approaching. Here was a chance. The way he looked, he was under no illusion that he presented an attractive prospect but the possibility of a ride out of there was the only way he could imagine surviving the day.

He stumbled out onto the road as the car turned the corner ahead of him, waving his arms and doing his best to block its chances of avoiding him.

It occurred to him that, if he wasn’t a safe distance away from Fratfield, he might be offering himself up to a perfect way of resolving the curse. He looked beyond the car and, absurdly, saw the rain in the distance, flowing towards him in a barely visible wall. If that was too close then no doubt the car wouldn’t stop, or its brakes would fail, or its tyres skid. Any moment now it would collide with him and send him broken, to the verge, where the Bride would finally have snared her victim.

The quiet road filled with the sound of squealing brakes and the car came to a halt a few feet away.

‘What the hell are you playing at?’ came a voice from the driver’s seat. ‘I could have had you over.’

The driver was a man in his late fifties, and the look on his face as he took note of the state of Toby could only be the precursor to a hasty U-turn.

Toby looked to the wall of rain as it crept ever closer.

‘Please,’ he begged, ‘I desperately need your help.’ He walked towards the car, being careful to stay in front of it, hopefully stopping the driver from being able to just drive off.

‘You been in an accident, lad?’ the man asked. ‘You look like you’ve been beaten from here to next week.’

‘Can you give me a lift?’ Toby asked. ‘I really need to get to town.’

The rain crept ever closer, and with it, Toby knew, the odds of the man saying ‘yes’ diminished.

The driver scratched at his face, clearly undecided. ‘What happened to you?’ he asked.

Trying to explain now would only take up time Toby didn’t have. He decided to take a risk, stepping out of the way of the car and moving towards the passenger door.

‘You wouldn’t believe it,’ he said. ‘I’m lucky to be alive.’

He pulled at the door handle. The door was locked. ‘Please?’ he asked again. ‘I really need to hurry. Just wait until I tell you all about it!’

The rain was now only feet away. The surface of the road changed colour where the water rushed across it, a line of dark grey that crept closer and closer. In the distance, just at the corner the car had recently taken, he caught a flash of movement in the tree line.

The driver reached over and unlocked the door. ‘Get in then,’ he said. ‘Can’t rightly leave you here, can I? I don’t make a habit of picking people up, though.’

‘Don’t blame you,’ Toby told him, climbing in. ‘But I can assure you I’m in no fit state to cause trouble. I just really need to get to town.’

‘Aye.’ The driver looked at him and Toby glanced at the rear-view mirror where the rain was now almost touching the car. He was aware that he had now endangered the driver if they didn’t get moving. What would happen if they drove away once the rain was touching them? Would the car slip off the road, killing them both?

The driver put the car in gear and pulled forward, just as the first few drops hit the rear window.

Toby watched in relief as the wet road receded in the rear-view mirror with every second.

‘Thank you so much,’ said Toby. ‘You’re a lifesaver.’

l) Who Knows?

April felt the wheels lose traction on the road and, for a moment, the car was out of control.

Ahead, the traffic on the Euston Road was a mess of lights distorted in the rain and she lifted her hands from the steering wheel, feeling an absurd relief in the notion of sailing out of control. Hadn’t she spent her whole life with her knuckles clenched? Desperately fighting for control and authority, kicking against the pricks? How wonderful to just let go for once. To throw up her hands and slide into the dark.

It felt like freedom.

m) Who knows?

‘What do you want?’ Shining asked, trying to focus his thoughts away from the images that flickered in the sky above him.

‘What do I always want?’ the voice asked. ‘Amusement. It’s a simple enough goal in life.’

‘And the current situation pleases you?’

‘It’s approaching fun, yes. You have to admit he’s good value. Most of you lot are terribly dour and functional. Fratfield is employed to be excessive. He’s a theatrical event! Curses, bombs and daggers in the night! I would have sold tickets if I weren’t so terribly possessive. At least I was able to make a small cameo.’

‘Controlling Man-dae … Of course …’

‘Puppeteering is rather my specialty.’

‘Did you have to cut the strings so brutally?’

‘Well, Fratfield could hardly leave him wandering around the garden, could he? Straight down to the cellar.’

‘A bit obvious that, as a hiding place. Fratfield went to such lengths to cover the fact that he’d checked it and sealed it up. He’d have been better off just keeping his mouth shut. But then, that’s the problem with theatrical types, always showing off.’

‘Intellectuals, too – they always have to show their workings, just in case we missed how clever they were.’

Shining looked at his sister, watching through her mind’s eye as she threatened a man with a gun. He needed to bring this to a close before there were any more casualties.

‘But it could be better, couldn’t it?’ he said. ‘As diverting as it’s been for you, playing alongside Fratfield, you’ve missed a trick rather.’

‘Tell me more.’

Shining smiled. ‘You already have me. You’ll always have me. But if you played your cards right, you could have Fratfield too. Wouldn’t that be better?’

‘Oh, August.’ The homeless man leaned into Shining’s eye-line. ‘Have you become so cold that you would trade your own life at the expense of someone else’s?’

‘It’s called espionage. We do it every day. You said yourself that Fratfield isn’t desperate enough to give himself up to you.’

‘He’s not. I’ve been offering my services free of charge. It seemed worthwhile, considering the pleasure of taking part. He’s a professional but he’s not an idiot. He’s been very careful not to be indebted to me. He wouldn’t risk that for the sake of completing the contract.’

‘And it’s paid off for him, hasn’t it?’ asked Shining. ‘He’s got everything he wants. We’ll all be dead, he’ll be the sorry hero, a couple of months on sick leave and he’ll be back on form. The double agent with tricks up his sleeve that only one department would ever suspect. A department that will have vanished as a threat.’

‘When you put it like that, I’m quite sickened at his good fortune.’

‘So why not do something about it? If you were to offer a little assistance to me, I could ensure that his fortunes take a turn for the bleak. Then, he would have no choice but to accept whatever deal you might offer.’

‘Oh, but that would be so traitorous. I’m not sure I could live with myself.’

‘Don’t give me that. It’s exactly what you’ve wanted all along. I know you well enough. You’ve been planting seeds from the first, telling Toby about the Doppelgänger Contract –’ A thought suddenly occurred to Shining. ‘And that little floor show in the motorway services that helped us identify the Bride.’

‘Not that you’ve used the information. I don’t know why I bother sometimes …’

Shining laughed. ‘Would you believe that was a main part of our suspecting Fratfield? And it wasn’t even him, it was you all along …’ He got back to his point. ‘So what’s it to be?’ he said. ‘A little trade? You help me deal with this mess and I’ll deliver Fratfield up to you.’

‘Are you quite sure you know what you’re offering? In my care, he could become quite intolerable, you know.’

‘I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. Espionage is all about the long game.’

‘It’s tempting …’

Shining watched his sister climb into her car, eyes full of angry tears. ‘Enough games!’ he shouted. ‘Stop pretending this isn’t exactly what you wanted in the first place.’

The homeless man laughed. ‘Oh, very well, you’ve got yourself a deal. But I’m not going to solve everything for you. I’ll help you, here and now, but Toby’s on his own.’

‘No. You reverse his curse too.’

‘I couldn’t even if I wanted to. Which I don’t. I mean, obviously, if he asked me for help
himself
, I might consider it.’

‘No! You’ll keep your claws out of him. Fine. Deal, give me the strength I need now and I’ll get you Fratfield.’

‘So nice doing business with you.’

n) Who knows?

Tae-young screamed as the body of one of the protesters fell past her, a dead look in his eyes. A soldier turned towards her, his baton raised. There was no point in trying to reason with him, she knew. Now that the violence had erupted it wouldn’t be contained. Fires burned until all the fuel was gone. She put her arms above her head, hoping at least that she could limit the damage as he swung the baton towards her.

It took her a second to understand why the blow didn’t connect. The baton was frozen in mid-air, a hand gripping its tip and holding it in place.

August Shining stepped out from behind the soldier, the baton still held in his grip.

‘Give me your hand,’ he said to Tae-young. ‘We’re leaving.’

o) Who knows?

Clive King looked down at the pills in his hand and imagined the warm blessing of a sleep that would never end. What was the point in fighting on when none of it ever really mattered? Best just to call it a day.

He lifted his hand to his mouth but another hand closed firmly over it.

‘Never think you know what the future holds, Clive,’ said August. ‘You’ll always be wrong.’

He turned King’s hand over and the pills tumbled to the floor.

‘Though you may as well neck the scotch because that’s rarely a bad idea.’

p) Who knows?

Jae-sung tried to drag himself into the light, his fingers slipping in the oily slick of refuse and rain that covered the ground. His head was a white-light of agony, his vision so blurred he could no longer separate the blur at the end of the alley into shop fronts and pedestrians. It was a tumble of noise and colour that was as remote to him as his home.

He knew he would probably never make it as far as the light, and the temptation to just roll over and let the darkness settle over him was extreme. He had no idea how badly wounded he was – after the first couple of kicks he had lost count of the actual effects. All he knew was that he no longer functioned. Perhaps, if he just rested for a while, he would come to with a little more clarity.

The floor smelt of vinegar and rot but he let his check press down into it, closing his eyes.

‘No time for that, old thing,’ came a voice and he felt arms lift him up as if he weighed nothing.

Draped over the shoulder of August Shining he looked up and smiled as the pain in his head faded away and they both stepped out into the light.

q) Who knows?

April’s hands hovered above the steering wheel as the car continued to skid. She shifted her foot away from the brake and leaned back in her seat. Let her fly wherever fate took her. She had no fight left in her. She wasn’t sure she could halt the car now even if she tried and why should she? To hell with it, why struggle for ever?

She looked on through the windscreen, as the car veered towards the busy road. She saw the red of a bus looming towards her.
That would do it
, she thought,
this little sardine can would be no competition.
Let her be folded into the metal of her silly little car, a footnote in the newspapers, a tatty bouquet left to wilt in the exhaust fumes.

There was a sudden movement and she saw August appear in the windscreen, running, stupidly, impossibly, towards the car. He collided with it, his hands slamming into the bonnet as he continued to run, pushing the car back just as the bus soared past, oblivious to how close it had come to a collision.

April just stared out into the rain and the face of her brother as he lifted his hands from the bonnet of the car, leaving two deep indentations from the impact.

He walked around to the driver’s door, opened it and she tumbled out and into his arms.

Silly old woman
, she thought as the tears flooded out of her and onto the lapel of his jacket.
He’ll never let you hear the end of this.

‘Oh shush,’ he said, as if she had spoken aloud. ‘What are we for if not for each other?’

He held her close as she dug her fingers into his thin shoulders and the rain was burnt away to steam as the night street was flooded with light.

r) Lufford Hall, Alcester, Warwickshire

Shining snapped awake as the light began to return to the entrance hall. He sat up.

Backing away in confusion, Fratfield was looking around trying to gauge his best route of escape. He turned and made a break for the rear exit, but his leading foot skidded in the shards of glass from the shattered chandelier and he flipped backwards, crashing to the floor with a bone-aching thud.

‘Unlucky,’ said Shining, looming over him. ‘Perhaps you’ve spread yourself a little thin?’

As the traitor moved to get to his feet, Shining kicked out with his right foot, sending the man’s head snapping back. Fratfield slumped back to the floor.