Free The Rain-Soaked Bride by Guy Adams

love with me in a minute, just give in to it, you’re only human.’
    She turned to Shining. ‘Are we going for a drink then?’
    d) The Moon and Sixpence, Wardour Street, Soho
    They settled down in the Moon and Sixpence, Cassandra attacking a large Diet Coke with gusto. ‘I don’t like alcohol,’ she said to Toby, ‘it makes me all squiffy. So what are you working on at the moment, then?’
    ‘It’s a weird one,’ said Shining. ‘You’ll like it.’ He gave her a vague rundown of the details, avoiding names but listing the pertinent facts in the deaths of Sir James, Leonard Holley and Sonia Finnegan. ‘It seems to me,’ he concluded, ‘to bear all the hallmarks of a curse.’
    ‘Could be,’ Cassandra admitted, surprising herself with a burp after drinking her Coke too quickly. She laughed and then suddenly looked deadly serious again. She looked at Toby. ‘How much do you know about curses?’
    ‘Not much.’
    ‘Didn’t think so, you looked too vanilla for that sort of thing. The principle behind a curse, or hex, or execration is simple enough: you wish someone ill and so you put that illness on them. In practical terms, it’s obviously not that simple. Human beings can’t go around wishing the world into the shape they want. Otherwise,’ she scowled, ‘I’d already be at the RSC.
    ‘Theoretically, it is possible to alter the physical through conjuration but the effects are usually limited and the skill needed to achieve such a thing are beyond most of us. Beating physics up with words is like trying to knock a brick over by blowing on it. For curses to work they have to tap into something else.
    ‘For example, you can’t blow a building up by talking at it and yet an army captain can speak a few commands into his walkie-talkie, order up a missile and achieve the same thing.’
    ‘But the missile is doing all the hard work,’ said Toby.
    Cassandra smiled. ‘Is it? The command, the desire, is coming from the army captain. If he hadn’t ordered it then the building would still be standing. The missile is just a tool, a means to an end. In magical terms (and philosophical ones for that matter), the power lies in the command not the method of execution.
    ‘Another important distinction: a curse is not a prayer. When casting a curse, it’s all about retention of dominance, you’re asking something to intercede, to act out your wishes, but you don’t want to concede power to it.
    ‘That said, to fall back on my terribly clever example, the missile can develop a mind of its own if the army captain isn’t careful. It’s a dangerous and complex business.’ She turned back to Shining. ‘From what you’ve told me, this could be a curse, yes. Or a more basic summoning.’
    ‘A summoning?’ asked Toby.
    ‘For that you’d need to talk to a demonologist,’ Cassandra said, grabbing at a menu. ‘Are we eating? I’m famished.’
    ‘I’m sure we can order something,’ Shining replied.
    ‘Just some nachos. Or garlic bread. Or maybe burgers. They do nice burgers. Or scampi. I like scampi. Funny little things, scampi. Have you ever seen one in the wild? I haven’t. I wonder if you can keep them as pets.’
    ‘What’s the difference between a summoning and a curse?’ asked Toby, trying to get things back on track.
    ‘Oh, well, they’re easy. A summoning is just calling on something. Invoking a force that then acts according to its own natural behaviour. It’s all about control again. In a summoning, the person calling on that force has no real control over what that force does, they just know that it will act in a certain fashion dependent on its usual habits. For example, if you unleash a lion in a field of sheep you can be fairly sure it’s going to end up with a belly full of lamb. If you put a lion in a fish tank you’re just going to end up with a lot of splashing and an angry lion. It’s all about knowing what you’re summoning. In fact,’ she smiled, ‘it’s all about