Page 7 of The Falconer

Move, I think to the revenant.Just a bit, so I don’t injure my gracious host.

The faery doesn’t move and I don’t have a clean shot. Time to intervene.

I lower the pistol and step into the room, shutting the door behind me with a loud click.

The revenant’s head snaps up. It bares two rows of long pointed teeth and gives a low, rumbling growl that makes the fine hairs on my arms stand straight up.

I smile sweetly. ‘Hello there.’

I detect some small movement from Lord Hepburn and I relax slightly. Still alive, thank goodness. The revenant’s black gaze tracks me as I move to stand near the velvet settee, but it stays where it is, still greedily drinking the poor man’s energy.

I need to force its attention to me again. ‘Drop him, you ghastly thing.’ The beast hisses and I step forward. ‘I said drop him.Now.’

My grip on the pistol tightens again as the creature releases Lord Hepburn and rises to its full height. Now that the faery has stopped feeding, the ammonia and sulphur flavour is back, scorching. The creature towers over me, muscled and dripping with some repulsive clear substance I would rather not inspect closely.

I’m filled with a familiar rush of excitement as the faery snarls again. My heart pumps faster. My blood rushes and my cheeks burn.

‘Aye, that’s it,’ I whisper. ‘Take me instead.’

The faery leaps forward.

Chapter 3

Iaim the pistol, but the faery is much faster than I expect, a blur of movement. It knocks the weapon from my hand before I can shoot and slams me into the wall. Wallpaper tears. A vase on the shelf next to us falls. Over the sound of shattering glass, I hear the pistol skid along the floor somewhere.Hell and blast.

The creature opens its mouth. Its saliva drips onto my silk bodice. The rancid stench of decay, with a hint of bare earth, invades my nostrils. I can’t help but gag.

Snarling, the faery pins me against the wall. My legs dangle. Claws scrape my middle and fabric shreds. I struggle.

I have to free myself before the revenant can take my energy, but I’m caught between the wall and its massive chest. The faery’s muscles bulge as it tries to keep me still, slicing through my dress and undergarments into my skin, leaving small cuts that burn as though they’ve been cauterised. Then it sinks its claws into me.

The faery breathes in and rips energy from me. Pain blossoms within my chest and fans outwards like needle pricks. Thousands upon thousands of tiny, agonising jabs all over my body.

‘Falconer,’ the revenant growls, and those dripping teeth widen into a hideous grin. ‘Falconer.’ The word is guttural; I only just understand it. Blood scorches under my skin. The pain is almost unbearable.

The faery’s eyes are shut, its body growing ever more still as my strength leaves me.

Stop struggling, I tell myself sternly.Focus.

I let myself slacken in the faery’s arms. It drags me closer until my forehead rests against its slick neck. I pretend to give myself over, to appear close to death as I desperately slither an arm from between us, a fraction at a time. It falls to my side, a dead weight. My body has become rock where it should be bones and flesh.

In that moment, my blood goes from hot to the most numbing kind of cold. My teeth chatter. In shock, I realise my breath is visible, as though the temperature in the room has dropped.

I clench my numb hands into fists. If I’m going to die, I’ll die fighting. Never at the mercy of any faery – not like my mother.

Strength resurging, I let out a fierce scream and slam a fist into the revenant’s soft spot, its abdomen.

The creature howls and staggers.

I drop to the floor and crawl to put some distance between us. I try to stand, but stars dot my vision. My dress – the blasted, impractical, smothering dress – catches under my toe and I stumble.

I look up just as the faery recovers. It launches itself at me again, and I manage to roll beneath its body.

My temples are pounding, but I ignore the headache. I shove my petticoats aside to grip the handle of thesgian dubhsnug in its sheath along my other thigh just as the faery rears back on its haunches, then jumps. I spin low to the ground, and have but a moment to aim for its soft spot again.

I won’t have another chance to surprise it. I sink my blade into the front of its massive torso.

The faery screeches and flails, knocking over what must have been an exceedingly expensive mahogany chair.

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