Page 101 of Hidden Kingdoms

“They did find her. The cameras have her following Basit street in the direction of her friend’s house before the lead ends on—” Blair began.

“Olanskig Street,” she cut in. “You don’t think I got their updates? She can’t have just vanished.” The anguish that twisted her face told me she knew what I did, that there was every possibility that she had.

“Why do you live here, Calloway?” Her job paid enough to live somewhere at least a district closer to the city centre.

A defensive bite came to her words. “What’s wrong with here?”

“It’s just you and the two girls?” I’d already spotted the smaller girl amongst Marina’s photos. Calloway only nodded, her eyes flicking to the black phone screen.

“Your husband?”

“He’s dead.”

I knew that.

“How?”

She chewed the side of her mouth, knee bouncing slightly as she found her words, as she debated on what to tell me. “Fighting pits.”

I didn’t know that.

I didn’t like that I didn’t know that.

Years of training kept the shock of her words from my face as I asked. “Whose?”

“We moved here, and I got my job—a good job. We had a house in Viersveit. One with panelled walls and fire poppies that grew all year. I could see the third boundary from my window.” Calloway tapped her phone screen once again, checking it before facing me. “Krie… he got into the wrong things.Deepinto the wrong things. So fucking deep.” Her breath left her in one long sigh. “We sold that house and moved here.” She waved her hand in gesture to the room they were in. “But, it wasn’t enough, therewas no way left but for him to take the out that was offered. A term in the fighting pits. How long he lasted, how much money he made them, would all come off the debt.”

“Whose pits, Calloway?” This case was turning in a completely different fucking direction with every word she spoke. The Darkness, traffickers and now the fighting pits. Not to mention she could just be a kid being a dick and running away from home. I wasn’t getting that vibe, but it was possible.

Would be the best of a shit list of options though.

“What does this have to do with Marina?” Her temper flared, as painful memories danced behind her eyes. “I’m paying that debt.”

Had Marina been taken to be used towards that debt? I tucked that information away for later.

“How long has she been missing?”

“Since yesterday morning,” the mum said, eyes flicking to Blair in confusion as she stared at photos of the missing girl lined up in age order, from a chubby little baby to what I knew was the most recent shots of her on a unit against the back wall. “She’s home from school for the week and said she was going to see her friend. When she didn’t come back at lunch, I just assumed she was eating there. Then it got later and later, and she wasn’t replying to my messages. I rang, but it cuts off every time.”

She unlocked her phone offering up the call log. 135 calls had been made to Marina’s number.

I took in the times, the date. There had been no reports of The Darkness anywhere near here, and I couldn’t sense any lingering stain from its rotten presence, but all that meant was it hadn’t been here, in the house.

“Has the phone turned on since?” I could see she had continued calling, a record of a mother’s hope that just once it would connect.

“No.” She put it back on the arm, tapping it to make sure it was still on before looking back at me.

“And the friend?”

“They said Marina never turned up.” Her words hitched as she spoke, and she pressed her hand against her mouth, eyes closed shut for a second.

It all lined up with the reports.

Missing girl in Sehksveit, fifteen years old, blonde hair, blue eyes—Anomaly. Last seen leaving home on Olanskig street, never made it to friend’s house. No trail found.

“Why didn’t that friend tell you Marina didn’t turn up? Did they not try to contact her the same way you had?” Blair asked, still facing the photos.

Another lead to be chased.

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