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

raised my hands once more. It wouldn’t be a gentle stream of magic this time; I was prepared to hit the shadow beast with full force.

Unfortunately for me, it was now wise to my movements. Before my power could be released, the beast swung towards me. It used one of its claws to snag the front of my T-shirt and haul me towards its gaping mouth. I writhed and wriggled, hoping that if I could generate enough movement the sharp claw would slice through the fabric and I’d fall to the ground. But I was well and truly caught and it appeared that no amount of shoogling was going to free me. I cursed to myself and grabbed the creature’s paw instead.

Its fur was surprisingly soft and my fingers sank down, disappearing into a blackness that wasn’t quite animal and wasn’t quite shadow but was something else entirely. At no point did I touch anything that suggested bone or cartilage or substantial body parts.

Before I had chance to ponder that little fact, Monroe was barking out a warning from below and the shadow beast was hauling me up towards its mouth. I caught the faintest glimpse of red-tinged eyes, enraged and deadly. Then its jaws opened wide and I knew exactly where the beast intended to put me.

I’d been inside a monster’s mouth before. In the very early days of the apocalypse, the Canal Monster caught me when I was trying to help out another poor soul. On that occasion I’d escaped because it was playing with its food. I didn’t get the impression that this monster was about to do the same. From the glint in its eye, it was determined to dispose of me as quickly as it could. I had to act fast.

I left my hands embedded in its paw and worked on building up the glow of magic deep in my belly. Just as the cavernous shadow mouth threatened to swallow me in one gulp, I released everything I had. My body jerked as the magic pulsated out of me and into the monster.

At first it didn’t seem to work. The monster tipped back its head, ready to drop me into its throat and swallow me whole – but then it hesitated for a fraction of a second before it released me. There was a strange choking sound, like it had a tickle in its throat. The choking became a splutter then an earth-quaking cough. It swung its arms from side to side, flailing desperately as it tried to breathe.

This time, the creature’s own movement was enough. Using the law of physics and oppositional forces, I pushed away from the direction in which its arm was pulling. The claw finally tore through the fabric of my T-shirt and I fell through air, just as the shadow beast staggered backwards and also started to fall.

I expected to land on the hard concrete below and I knew that this time I’d definitely break a bone or two. I tried to twist in mid-air so at least I didn’t land on my spine. I shouldn’t have worried; Monroe was already there, returned to human form with his arms outstretched. He should have given more thought to his heroics, though, as we both ended up sprawled on the ground, albeit with his body beneath mine. The pained grunt he emitted when I smacked into him didn’t sound pleasant. Still, we were safe and the shadow beast had finally stopped moving.

I extricated myself from Monroe and stood up. Cricking my neck and feeling far more achy than I had ten minutes earlier, I glanced down at him. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Peachy,’ he muttered. His arm was lying at an unnatural angle. I grimaced and reached down to help him up.

He shifted back into wolf again and his bones creaked and snapped, then he returned to human, rubbing his now unbroken arm. An impressive bruise was already forming on his tanned skin. It was just as well that werewolves healed quickly.

‘Remind me not to do that again in a hurry,’ he said. ‘Are you hurt?’

‘I’m fine.’ My aches and pains were hardly life threatening.

We turned towards the fallen body of the shadow beast. I couldn’t see any sign of life but, to be sure that the damn thing wasn’t playing possum, I edged round to check its face. Its eyes were open wide and staring. I breathed out. That was that.

I blew my hair out of my eyes and walked down the road. I grabbed my backpack from where I’d left it and took out the bundled-up clothes I was carrying for Monroe. He offered me a lopsided grin when I handed them to him and started pulling on the tracksuit bottoms.

‘It’s unusual,’ I said, enjoying a last-minute gawk at his toned body before it disappeared, ‘for any creature to take us on by itself.’ In fact, it was more than unusual. In the last few months, Manchester and all its citizens, monstrous or otherwise, had settled into a live-and-let-live situation. Creatures like this shadow beast were well aware of our skills and tended to leave us alone unless they were provoked. They weren’t usually stupid and they wanted to survive as much as we did. This beast hadn’t appeared particularly dumb – certainly not dumb enough to flout the unwritten rules that had been slowly developing since the apocalypse.

Monroe’s head poked through his T-shirt and he frowned. ‘Food is getting scarce for all of us,’ he said. ‘Perhaps it was very hungry. And three of those things attacked Felicity last week.’

I wrinkled my nose. ‘Three of them – and they still failed. She walked away. For one of them on its own to attack suggests there’s more going on here than meets the eye.’

‘Go on then,’ he said. ‘What are the odds that Blackie here had an ulterior motive?’

‘Five to four,’ I answered instantly. Even then I was erring on the side of caution. I paused and tilted my head to the