Page 15 of Waifs And Strays
Now I had to work quickly. I unzipped the carrier and carefully lifted her out. Her fur was dirty, suggesting that she’d had a particularly hard time lately and hadn’t been inclined to groom herself. Laying her on her side, I examined the wound before I set about cleaning it.
The edges were ragged and I reckoned she’d been attacked by something; hopefully it had been a wild animal and not a Preternatural who’d decided, as Nick had suggested, to put cats on the menu. I cleaned away the pus and the dried blood then gently rubbed in the special ointment and murmured a basic incantation.
He Who Must Sleep started to purr, indicating that the magic was filling the room. That was good. As long as She Who Hisses didn’t try anything stupid, the wound would heal within hours.
Her eyes were starting to twitch so I hastily completed my ministrations, picked her up and carried her into the small back room. I made her a warm bed with some blankets and left a litter tray, plenty of food and several empty boxes that she could hide in or behind if she wanted to. She could stay there for twenty-four hours before I released her back into the wild. I already knew she wouldn’t choose to stay with me; She Who Hisses was not that sort of cat.
When I returned to the kitchen, He Who Must Sleep had jumped onto the windowsill and was staring into the garden. I followed his gaze; all four of my other cats were outside, perched on the wall, their eyes wide and their ears pinned back.
I washed my hands and ambled outside to talk to them. ‘She’s been taken care of and she’s locked in the back so shewon’t disturb you. You can come in for dinner. I’m sorry I’m late getting it to you.’
None of them made a move and I frowned. I’d taken care of plenty of feral cats in the past: there was one large tom cat called He Who Fathers Many Litters who’d been so badly injured he’d stayed for a full week and kept half the street awake at night with his furious protests. Although they’d kept their distance, none of my house cats were bothered by his presence, so what was the problem with She Who Hisses?
I put my hands on my hips. ‘She won’t hurt you and she’s going to recover quickly,’ I reiterated. ‘There’s really no need to worry.’
That was when He Who Crunches Bird Bones raised his head and looked pointedly towards the first floor of the house. My stomach dropped as I realised that the cats’ wariness had nothing to do with She Who Hisses; it had to be related to Nick. He Who Must Sleep was still staring at us from the kitchen window. He was the only one who hadn’t noticed anything, probably because he’d been fast asleep.
‘What is it?’ I asked as snaking tendrils of dread filtered through my body. ‘What’s happened to him?’
The four cats dropped their heads and avoided my eyes. As I stared at them, I belatedly noticed the long black mark on She Without An Ear’s left flank; it looked like an acid burn. He Who Crunches Bird Bones had a similar wound on his tail.
I glanced around and spotted the same mark scorched into the ground. Somebody had been here – somebody had attacked my cats. I hissed and moved over to them. The wounds were shallow and would heal quickly but that didn’t make me feel any better.
Quickly returning to the house, I jogged up the communal stairs until I reached Nick’s small flat. The smashed front doorwas hanging off its hinges and my anxiety intensified tenfold. Oh no: this was not good at all.
Tension made my limbs feel stiff and awkward as I went inside and the iron scent of lupine blood reached my nostrils. I had a horrible premonition that I was going to walk into the living room and find Nick’s dead body. I swallowed hard. I didn’t want this but I had to see the truth for myself.
I held my breath as I walked down the small hallway then paused and tilted my head. Whatever had happened here was over; there was nobody inside the flat. Nobody alive, anyway.
I closed my eyes briefly then stepped into the living room and looked around. No Nick and no body, though there was a puddle of blood in the middle of the floor and the outline of several splatters along one wall that someone had tried to clean up but which had left a mark on the fresh paintwork.
Moving more quickly, I checked the rest of the flat. The kitchen was untouched; it didn’t look as if Nick had even crossed the threshold. There was nothing untoward in the bathroom so I moved into the bedroom. The bed was unmade and there was a pile of clothes on the floor, but nothing to suggest anything dramatic had happened. The action, whatever it was, had occurred in the living room.
I returned to the scene of the crime. Although there was a fair amount of blood, it wasn’t enough to signify a death: half a pint, I reckoned, less than any normal person would donate in a blood bank.
My brow furrowed and I knelt down to examine the bloody puddle more closely. Whoever it belonged to had been standing here, been attacked but hadn’t moved from this spot.
I twisted my head and checked the rug; it had been replaced after the last tenant so the pile hadn’t yet properly settled. There was the imprint of a very large footprint. I couldn’t becertain – it was only a damned rug after all – but it looked far too big to be Nick’s.
I lowered myself to the floor and sniffed it delicately. I didn’t possess even a whisper of vampiric heritage so I had to concentrate hard to be sure, but when I caught a whiff of earthiness I knew that the blood had definitely come from a werewolf. Whether that werewolf had been Nick or not remained to be seen.
I straightened up and squashed any thought of the earnest, grieving boy in order to examine the scene with an analytical eye. I had never been part of a clean-up crew or visited a crime scene, but I’d been responsible for plenty of tableaux like this. I had more than enough experience and I knew what to look for.
I swivelled to my left and gazed at the faint stains on the wall, looked down once more at the puddle then back at the wall. Hmm. None of the furniture had been disturbed so there hadn’t been much of a fight. Whatever had happened in here had happened quickly. And yet…
Wrinkling my nose, I leaned in to the wall. Whoever had tried to clean it had used the lemony detergent I’d left in the flat when I’d cleaned the place after the last tenant had departed. I was forced to get so close that the tip of my nose almost brushed against the stain – but I registered the lingering scent of blood beneath the sweet aroma.
I walked backwards through the flat to the battered front door then re-traced my steps for a second time as I ran a series of possible scenarios in my mind.
Somebody had come to the door, somebody who knew exactly who Nick was and where he was staying. They hadn’t knocked or rung the doorbell but had kicked in the door and marched straight into the living room where Nick had probably been lounging on the sofa. He’d jumped up when his assailant had entered the room and lashed out in self-defence. Thataccounted for the spray of blood on the wall – and why it had been cleaned up and the blood on the floor hadn’t.
Blood could be used for all sorts of things and it was wise not to leave any of your own behind. Any witch worth their salt could use fresh blood to establish someone’s identity; if they were canny enough, they could even place a curse from a distance on the person it had come from.
After Nick had made his move to defend himself, the mysterious assailant must have struck at him in return, quite possibly with a knife, slashing his skin, creating a deep wound, and then grabbing him as he bled. The attacker obviously hadn’t cared too much about the blood that Nick had left in the living room. However, there was no blood in the hallway or on the stairs so it was more than likely that they’d also knocked him out and taken the time to bind the wound, probably to disguise any trail. Then they’d hauled him out of the flat and away.
No doubt He Who Crunches Bird Bones and She Without An Ear had tried to prevent the getaway and Nick’s assailant had probably thrown magical acid at them as a form of defence. Both cats were fast and knew how to avoid predators, but they were lucky they’d escaped with only minor wounds.
Nick’s wound was unlikely to have been a mortal one, though that didn’t mean he was still alive. He could have been dragged off and killed elsewhere. Thankfully, the fact that he hadn’t been killed in the flat suggested that his assailant hadn’twantedto kill him – at least not yet.
