Chapter 14
They parked outside the bookshop that Cyrus’s mother, Margaret, owned.
‘How’s she doing? Do you know?’ Evie asked.
‘No,’ said Ash. ‘We’ve only seen her once. She came to the warehouse a week or so after it happened and collected a few of Cyrus’s things. Told us we were welcome to stay there for a while if we needed a place to live. But we haven’t seen her or heard from her since.’
‘She didn’t look so good though,’ Vero added, almost redundantly.
Margaret had lost her only child. Evie could imagine that Margaret was probably doing worse than she was, given that Cyrus was her only child and she had spent her life trying to protect him from the thing that had eventually killed him.
Evie cast a glance in the direction of the bookshop that Margaret owned. It was bustling this weekend morning with young couples and arty-looking types, all reading their papers while sipping their lattes at the tables inside. Everyone was so oblivious, so unaware of what was going on around them, of the fact that three Hunters were sitting in a car a few metres away and that the city was being overrun with demons.
‘So are we going in, then?’ asked Evie finally, trying to ignore the thrumming headache crashing against her skull and her overwhelming tiredness.
Ash twisted around to look at her over his shoulder, his dark eyes hooded by lack of sleep and maybe something else – something that seemed more like an apology.
‘Maybe it’s better if you wait out here,’ he said, avoiding looking at her directly.
An uncomfortable silence filled the car. Vero started fidgeting with the door handle.
‘I know why you’re saying that,’ Evie said in as even a voice as she could summon, ‘but I want to come in.’
Ash studied her for a moment and then exhaled loudly while mumbling something which sounded to Evie like, It’s your funeral.
They strolled through the café part of the shop, dodging and weaving around outstretched legs, and had almost made it to the door at the back of the store that led up to Margaret’s office when a waitress – a tall girl with dark hair in braids – stepped in front of Evie and let out an ear-splitting squeal. Her name was Darcy. Evie remembered her from before.
‘You! You’re one of Cyrus’s friends!’ the girl screeched. ‘Were, I mean. Weren’t you in his band?’
Evie’s gaze shifted to the muffin and coffee sitting on the tray the girl was carrying. ‘Yeah, something like that,’ she mumbled.
‘It’s terrible, isn’t it?’ Darcy said, her voice cracking and her eyes beginning to shine with tears. ‘So hard to believe. There one minute, gone the next. Just crossing a street. I mean it’s just – it could have happened to anyone.’
Evie felt the scream building inside her. For an instant she entertained the idea of kicking the tray out of the girl’s hands and watching it fly across the store. Her rage was simmering dangerously and she fought to bring it back under control. It couldn’t have just happened to anyone. That was the thing – that was what she was mad about. Cyrus had given his life to save the world and no one even knew about his sacrifice. It was so damn unfair.
Suddenly she felt fingers squeezing her arm and glancing down saw Vero’s hand circling her wrist, gripping it in warning. Evie realised that her hands were fisted and her body tensed to spring. She took a deep breath and forced a smile before walking around Darcy and pushing through the door.
Even from a distance Evie could feel Margaret, that familiar buzzing sensation hitting her right in the solar plexus. The three of them hesitated for a moment in front of the door before Ash knocked tentatively.
‘Mrs Locke?’ he called out. ‘It’s me, Ash. We’ve come to talk to you. Can we come in?’ he asked.
They heard footsteps dragging towards the door, a shuffling sound as the key was turned in the lock. Finally the door fell open and Evie did an immediate double take.
The woman standing in the doorway was a spectre, as hollow-eyed as a skeleton, unrecognisable from the woman she’d been just two months before. Margaret’s clothes hung off jutting bones and her short, honey-coloured hair was greasy and uncombed. She stared glassy-eyed at Ash before her gaze roved over Evie. She blinked then and Evie saw a trace of the old Margaret in the flare of anger that gripped her face in the second before her fingers curled around the door and she slammed it in their faces.
Ash slid his foot into the crack just in time.
‘Mrs Locke,’ he said, wedging his shoulder against the door and speaking through the gap, ‘we just came to ask you one thing and then we’ll go. I promise. We’re not here to cause you any more grief.’
Margaret didn’t move her weight from the door.
‘Please?’ Ash tried again,. ‘It will only take a moment.’
There was a pause and then the door flew suddenly open, sending Ash stumbling into the room. Vero and Evie stepped gingerly over the threshold.
Margaret had crossed to the window and was standing there with her back to them. Her shoulders were stiff, her head held high. Evie scanned the room quickly. Piles of books were spread across the desk and stacked up on the surrounding floor area. She couldn’t read the titles from where she was standing but they looked old and dusty, not exactly the latest Stephen Kings and Jodi Picoults. The sight of all those books reminded Evie that Margaret had once upon a time been researching the Hunter family tree. Evie wondered what she was now studying and why she was even bothering.
‘What is it?’ Margaret asked in a hoarse voice as if she’d spent the last two months crying. ‘What do you want?’
‘We think maybe you have something we could use,’ Vero said.
Evie watched Margaret’s shoulders tense as Vero pressed on. ‘A shadow blade?’
Margaret whipped around, her eyes now bright and alert. ‘Why do you want a shadow blade?’ she demanded.
‘Because we’re finishing what Cyrus started,’ Ash answered calmly. ‘We’re going after the unhumans left in this realm. The ones that came through before the gateway closed. There are more Originals than the one we killed in the Bradbury and we can’t fight them with normal weapons. We need shadow blades.’
Margaret’s expression darkened. ‘Why are you still fighting them?’ she asked.
Ash shrugged. ‘Someone’s got to.’
‘And if we don’t, then won’t Cyrus have died for nothing?’ Vero added. ‘He died to end this thing. The least we can do is make sure it really has ended.’
At the mention of Cyrus’s name, Margaret collapsed backwards against the desk, grief taking over, her shoulders slumping in defeat. Evie fought the instinct to reach forward and place her hand on the woman’s shoulder and … and she didn’t know what exactly. She just knew that she felt something of this woman’s pain and wanted her to know that she understood it.
She kept her hands glued to her sides though, knowing that the last thing Margaret would want was her sympathy.
‘I know you wish it had been me,’ Evie said quietly.
Margaret’s head instantly flew up.
‘I wish it had been me too,’ Evie continued, faltering over the words. ‘And I want you to know that I’m going to kill Victor once this is over. I promise you that.’
Margaret frowned at her for a moment before the tension evaporated from her body. She hung her head. ‘I’m sorry I handed you over to Victor,’ she said.
Evie blinked at her in astonishment. She hadn’t expected that. ‘I understand,’ she said as the silence stretched on. ‘I would have done the same.’
The two of them stared at each other for a few more seconds, recognition and understanding passing between them, and Evie felt a portion of the ache inside her ease a little. Margaret too seemed to pull herself together. She strode to the cabinet on the wall and threw open the doors, revealing an impressive display of weaponry – both antique and modern. When she turned back towards them they could see that she was holding something.
Evie stepped forward, her gaze dropping to the slender blade lying across Margaret’s palms. It had a long hilt, and the blade was shaped like a dagger. Evie tried to imagine an unknown warrior forging it centuries ago in the dark desert of the Shadowlands. Margaret offered it to her and her fingers closed greedily around the hilt. It was so light it practically floated upwards out of Margaret’s hands as though normal laws of gravity didn’t apply to it. The others pressed in on her for a look. The blade was as long as Evie’s forearm and was glowing slightly, like a pearl under water.
‘Thank you,’ Evie said, looking up, but Margaret had already turned away and was standing with her back to them, staring out of the window at nothing.