Page 49 of Shadow & Stars
“Who is he?”
Jaz ran into the other room.
Ugh. Fuck this!
I followed him into the smaller bedroom. Whoever the shouty prick was, he began pounding the front door.
Jaz opened the metal board over the bedroom window enough for him to slip through.
“Jaz!” the man boomed. “Get the fuck out here!”
The warlock vanished through the crack, audibly climbing down a drainpipe.
Rather than experiment with walking through the metal board to see if I floated or plunged to the ground, I hurried down the stairs. The man on the other side of the front door grunted, keeping up his pounding.
That was one secure door.
“Go around the back!” the dickhead yelled to someone else.
What joy. More than one arsehole looking for violence.
I ran through the empty living room, passing through a closed door into a kitchen and kept going, reaching the back garden just as Jaz jumped off the drainpipe.
“What are you doing here? Get?—”
The back gate to my right crashed open, revealing a woman with a shotgun.
And she fired.
15
XAVIER
Iwent looking for it in an internet café on Bethnal Green Road, mine not set up yet, and no human phone to hand right now.
Because magic wasn’t lost, I hid my white demon eyes in their icy blue disguise, walking the streets just like any other human.
Before entering the café I looked left, to the top of the road. Looming above the railway bridge in the distance was a demon tower, it’s red jewel off. If I shifted in its presence, a repelling red light would ignite and attack. Thankfully, I possessed a strong constitution to withstand demon towers for a limited time.
Not that I would be shifting in this café.
I entered the building, considering the possibility of meeting myself here. Or had I replacedhim?
My stomach quivered, a potent and real fear on my back.
Anything is possible…
A woman with a severe black bob and thick red glasses looked up from her desk to greet me. “Evening.” She was holding a book about the end of the world.
How appropriate.
“Hello. May I use one of the computers?” I smiled, all friendly and warm.
There were five long tables with six computers sectioned into booths for privacy. Four people tapped away on the keyboards, going about their business.
“Sure. It’s three pounds per hour.”
I paid for two with cash. “Thank you.”
