Free Blood by K. J. Wignall Page A

scaring her like this and then leaving her on her own? There was nothing for it but to walk on.
    Cautiously, he started to move again and his nerves settled a little. She stayed close but, still whispering, she said, “Slightly freaking me out now, Will.”
    â€œIt’s probably nothing,” he said. But he’d never known an atmosphere this strange, and now that he thought about it, the air had been unstable from the moment he’d killed Jex, and maybe before that. There was something ill at ease across the entire city, as if it had been cut loose from its moorings and was now adrift in the night.
    And suddenly he was even more disturbed by the realization that he had once known an atmosphere this strange, in the weeks before the witches had burned and his sickness struck. Could it be that the same evil had returned to the city? If so, he wasn’t sure that he was ready for it.
    He’d wanted to meet the person who’d done this to him for so long, and had still until a few hours ago, but now he was with the girl, the prospect set his nerves on edge. She was important to him in some way and he wanted the time and space to find out why, and to know that he wasn’t leading her into danger.
    They reached the gap between the scaffold-clad building and the next. Will stopped again and looked up the dark lane between the two buildings, staring in the general direction of the warehouse that had burned. There was nothing at first, but then he sensed some movement in the distant shadows.
    It appeared almost as if something was moving towards them, close to the wall, low to the ground, but he couldn’t actually see anything. It wasn’t an animal or anything solid, more like a disturbance in the air, as if the darkness was becoming liquid around some rapidly moving object.
    His body tensed up violently as the realization hit home. He grabbed Eloise by the arm and shouted, “Quick!” He ran back ten paces, dragging her with him, and shouted, “Stay behind me!”
    She was panicked and shouted, “Will, you’re scaring me!”
    He ignored her and looked around for something to defend himself with, and more importantly, something to defend her. He was still looking when he heard a growl and turned to see a black dog had emerged from the gap and was standing on the path in front of them.
    It wasn’t the dog he’d seen briefly in the church, but the other one he’d noticed sleeping by the stove, not as wiry, a shaggier coat. It didn’t advance at first, but stood snarling at them, its eyes fixed on Will.
    â€œIt’s just a dog,” said Eloise nervously. “We just need to back away slowly.”
    Will kept staring, but from the corner of his eye spotted an orange-and-white traffic cone under the scaffolding—unfortunately there didn’t seem to be anything else at hand that he could use.
    â€œOh my God,” said Eloise, with a mixture of confusion and concern for the animal. “I think it’s on fire.”
    Sure enough, smoke had started to rise up from the dog’s matted fur as if it had been caught in a fire and was still smoldering. At the same time, its shape seemed to be becoming unstable, then all at once, it sprang forwards and simultaneously burst into flames.
    Eloise screamed, and maybe said something, too, though he couldn’t make out her words. The dog didn’t seem in any way slowed down or harmed by the flames, but if the plan had been to strike terror into Will, this demon had found his weakness. Fire.
    He jumped urgently towards the traffic cone, picked it up with one hand, and started to turn back. He was so overcome with fear of the flames that he felt as if he was moving through molten lead, that he was too slow, that the dog would be upon him before he was able to do anything.
    Even if he’d imagined his slowness, the dog had moved with terrifying speed and as he turned to face it, the animal was only