Page 17 of Skulk of Foxes
The face of a harried-looking man with a dishevelled suit jacket and a barely knotted tie filled the television screen. ‘Good afternoon, Tim. I certainly can’t explain pink elephants. That is a phenomenon which us weather men are unfamiliar with. I can confirm, however, that there was a localised event in the Greater Manchester area that affected the skies. At this stage, we believe it was a small storm caused by a sudden rush of rising air. That accounts for the sudden darkening of the skies. It’s not been confirmed yet, but we also believe there might have been a small earthquake which would have added to the situation. It’s an unusual event but not beyond the realms of possibility.’
‘But the swarms of wild animals which eyewitnesses have reported? Can you account for those?’
‘Well, I’m no expert but it is often documented that animals are more sensitive to extreme weather changes and earth tremors than the human population.’
‘Can we expect further scenes like this?’
The supposed expert shook his head. ‘Oh no. There’s absolutely no reason to feel alarmed. This is a simply a case of Mother Nature reminding us that she can be volatile from time to time.’
I snorted. I could be volatile from time to time – but I couldn’t conjure up freaking pink elephants.
‘Turn it off, Jodie,’ Morgan said. He ran a distracted hand through his hair and went to the bar. He poured himself a large whisky and downed it in one long gulp. Jodie did as he asked then did the same, swallowing down a full tumbler of Scotch with barely a grimace. Unwilling to be left out of this little party, I stalked over and grabbed the bottle. One swig, however, and I was choking and spluttering.
I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Perhaps I’d lay off the whisky. It was probably lethal to anyone who didn’t have Scottish blood. I threw a quick glance at Morgan, envisioning him in a kilt with nothing underneath. Mmmm.
‘What is it, Maddy?’ he asked. ‘You look like you just thought of something important.’
‘Yes,’ I nodded, imagining getting my hands on Morgan’s sporran. Then I remembered where I was and what was going on. I cleared my throat and sobered up. ‘It’s obvious, isn’t it? This is to do with us. It’s magic related. There’s no other explanation, no matter what Fred Bellows or the BBC seem to think.’
Timmons scratched his head. ‘It can’t be the sphere. It’s not been activated or we’d all know about it.’
Morgan poured another glass of whisky. I shuddered. ‘I agree,’ he said. ‘Definitely magic and definitely not the sphere. It might not be Fey related at all though.’
‘Maybe,’ Vandrake suggested, ‘it’s the spirit of Chen coming back to haunt us for being complete idiots.’
‘You might be an idiot,’ I told him. ‘I most certainly am not. There’s no way any of this is because of us. As I said to the others, it might be our responsibility but it can’t be our fault. It’s impossible.’
The front door to the bar burst open and Artemesia appeared, panting for breath and sweating profusely. ‘This is our fault!’ she gasped. ‘You saw what happened outside? It’s because of us!’ Her eyes swung wildly from one person to another. ‘That’s not all. It’s going to keep happening.’ She hunched her shoulders; she genuinely seemed to be terrified. ‘I can promise you all one thing.’ She drew in a breath. ‘This is only the beginning.’
Chapter Six
It took some time to get Carduus’s errant niece to calm down and explain what she knew. Apparently she had a considerable array of test equipment set up back in her makeshift laboratory. She’d been experimenting with warning systems to indicate if and when the sphere’s power was tampered with. When the Manchester skies had darkened and a minor hell had been unleashed on the city, she’d sprung into action. As much as an apothecary could spring into action: I suspected that involved running over to scraps of paper and crunching numbers with a chewed pencil.
‘The tests are conclusive,’ she declared.
She glared at us as if expecting an argument. I was tempted, not because I had any reason to disbelieve her but because it would have been fun.
‘Residual Fey magic is lingering in the atmosphere,’ Artemesia went on. ‘It’s been building up for months. Think of it like a pressure-valve system. The magic needs an outlet and, sadly, it found one. We’re just lucky that no one appears to have been seriously hurt.’
‘So we’re alright now? It won’t happen again because enough magic has been siphoned off?’ Timmons questioned.
‘No,’ she sighed. ‘It’s difficult to explain in layman’s terms. As magical beings present in a non-magical demesne, our very presence causes a build-up of magic. There’s nothing we can do stop it, short of leaving this demesne for good.’
Everyone snorted at that. If we could leave for good, we’d already have done it. Apart from Timmons; he’d chosen a human name over his Fey one and admitted to me that he liked it here better than Mag Mell. I guessed that, as a Travotel manager, complimentary hotel toiletries did it for him in the same way that Morgan did it for me.
‘We’ve also been using magic,’ Artemesia said. ‘Not a lot but enough to add to the increase in the atmosphere. It wasn’t dangerous until a few days ago when there was a far longer use of magic than I’ve ever seen before. It sent all my equipment skyrocketing. Of course, with everything else that was going on at the time it took me a while to get to the lab and notice. What happened today was a minimal release. It won’t be long before the city reaches tipping point once again.’
‘So there will be more of these magical pressure releases?’ Morgan asked grimly.
Artemesia nodded. ‘Yep. And I reckon that the more they happen, the worse they’re likely to get.’
That didn’t bode well at all. Vandrake spoke up from the corner. ‘This added burst of magic which pushed us over the edge,’ he said. ‘Can you tell where it came from? If we can pinpoint its location, we can make sure that whoever did this is warned and doesn’t do it again.’ The corners of his mouth turned down. ‘Assuming it wasn’t a deliberate act on Rubus’s part.’
Artemesia grimaced. ‘As far as I can tell, there was no single location. The magic was occurring across the city. It was probably one faery – and they were probably on the move at the time.’
Morgan’s face was dark with fury. ‘Don’t people realise how dangerous it is to wield our magic around this demesne? They’ve been told time and time again. We have enough to deal with, given all that’s happening with the sphere. We don’t need rogue faeries making matters even worse.’
Suddenly I started to get a rather uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.
