City of Magic: The Complete Series by Helen Harper (book club recommendations TXT) 📕

at the barricade and yelling for you. You’ve to get there now. John’s got a gun and he’s pointing it at her. She’s got some kind of sword. There’s—’

I was already out of the door and running. Monroe was beside me and overtook me in a heartbeat. He didn’t shift into his werewolf form, but I knew from the magic buzzing underneath my own skin that he would in an instant if the situation called for it.

We sprinted towards the noise. There was a lot of shouting and screaming going on. Some people were ducking into their houses for safety; others were running with us to try and help out.

‘Charley! Enchantress! If I don’t see you in the next sixty seconds, I am not going to be responsible for my actions!’

Monroe slammed through the crowd, ignoring the people he shoved to the side, and I followed him through the ensuing gap. There, standing on the roof of a battered-looking van, stood Alora the bogle. Gone was the calm, queenly figure I’d met the other day – now she was a creature of absolute fury. It didn’t help that she was brandishing a lethal-looking sword with her right hand, which gleamed as it caught the sunlight. She was also holding a furious Anna by a hank of her hair with her left hand.

‘I’ll cut her head off if any of you come any closer!’ Alora spat. ‘And more of my kind will follow after me!’

‘Charlotte’s here,’ Monroe said, his voice raised. ‘I’m here. What’s the problem? What’s happened?’

Alora’s wild eyes turned in our direction but she didn’t relax at the sight of us. If anything, her fury grew. She twisted her hand, pulling sharply at Anna’s hair and forcing the policewoman’s neck into an unnatural and painful position. Anna didn’t make a sound, but I could see from the grimace on her face how much the action hurt.

‘One thing,’ Alora spat. ‘We only asked you to do one thing. We accepted the mermaid’s intrusion. We spoke politely. We came to an understanding. Or so I thought.’

I shook my head in desperate confusion. ‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘What’s happened?’

I wasn’t sure she’d heard me because she merely continued with her tirade. ‘Did you want them to die? Were you trying to get rid of them? Is that what it was? Or were you trying to hurt us because we refused to trade? We were never a threat to you. What you’ve done was completely unnecessary. I thought you were a decent person but you’re nothing more than a bloodthirsty bitch.’

I flinched. The vicious hatred in her tone was nothing I hadn’t experienced before, but as far as I could tell she was teetering on the edge of sanity. I had to prioritise. Monroe was right – safety first.

When I spoke again, I sounded far calmer than I felt. ‘Everyone get back inside and stay there.’

For a second no one moved then Monroe lifted his head and howled. Before he’d finished, they’d all scattered, guns and all. At least now we’d have some breathing space. A fraction of a second of breathing space.

‘You might think you’re protecting them,’ Alora snarled. ‘But you can’t protect them all. Not after what you’ve done.’ As if to add weight to her words, she tightened her hold on Anna’s hair. Shit. Whatever was going on here, it wasn’t good.

I held up my palms to indicate that I wasn’t fighting her. Not yet, anyway. ‘I don’t know what I’ve done. Believe me, Alora, I don’t know what’s wrong. You have to explain what the problem is.’

‘She’s right,’ Monroe said. ‘We don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘You wouldn’t know because she’s probably stabbed you in the back as well,’ Alora said to him. ‘They were human. We know this was her doing, not yours. If this was down to you, you’d have sent wolves.’

Dread spread through me, its icy tentacles snaking through my veins and squeezing at my heart. ‘Who are you talking about?’ I asked. ‘You have to tell us what happened.’

Alora gazed at me. For a strange moment, it felt as if her eyes were searing into my soul. ‘So,’ she said, more softly, ‘you didn’t send them after all.’ Her mouth tightened. ‘It doesn’t matter. They could only have known of our existence because you told them. How long did it take for you to break your promise to keep quiet about us? Was it days? Or merely hours?’

‘I…’ I didn’t know what to say. ‘Alora, I didn’t tell anyone. I mentioned the mermaid, I did explain about Nimue, but I didn’t tell anyone about you or the other bogles. I promise.’

‘This was an accident?’ Her words were calm but her expression was not. ‘I find that hard to believe.’

I gestured helplessly. ‘I still don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Alora bared her teeth and waved her sword menacingly in the air. ‘Then,’ she said, ‘come and see for yourselves.’

Chapter Twenty

Monroe and I went with her. Alora released Anna, whose venomous rage at being held hostage even if for a short while, was barely contained. I only just managed to persuade her to stay behind for the good of everyone else. Given the vicious looks and bristling tension I was still receiving from Alora, the fewer of us who walked into the bogles’ territory the better.

Alora was calmer now but she still held onto her sword, ready to wield the pointy end at me at any given moment. I kept a wary eye on her while Monroe drove, wondering if I could defend myself against the unmitigated fury that still bubbled beneath her suddenly serene exterior.

‘You have to understand,’ she said, continuing to finger the edge of the blade, ‘that things have not been easy for us. Even before the apocalypse, we had to be careful. Our skin was not so green then and it was easier to hide, but we were still magical beings in a non-magical landscape.’ She jerked her head at Monroe.