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

It might have only been September but the water was still an icy shock, penetrating my clothes and making my heart judder. I broke through to the surface, treading water and shaking droplets from my face. I scanned round. There. The person was there.

I am no Olympic swimmer but I did my best. It helped that there was still a powerful undercurrent from my magical surge pulling me towards the floating body. As soon as I reached him, I hooked my arm round his neck and made sure he was on his back. His lips were blue, and I had no way of knowing whether he was breathing or not.

I had to get him to shore but the current that had propelled me towards him was now working against me. I kicked my legs as hard as I could, but it felt like I was getting nowhere. Brackish, foul water washed over both our heads and panic wrapped its way around my brain, squeezing tight.

‘Come on, Charley,’ I muttered. ‘Come on.’

Another surge of water heaved over us. My jeans were wet and heavy, pulling at my legs, and it felt like we were sinking. I heard a hoarse shout that sounded like it had come from Monroe but I couldn’t be sure.

I wasn’t convinced I could make it back to safety without letting go of the man, but there was no way that I was going to leave him here to drown.

Magic. If I could use magic to push the air away from me, I could use magic to pull me in, like I had with the trolleys earlier. I craned my neck round, catching a glimpse of the bank behind us before my vision blurred. There was a tree there, a thing of monstrous girth and snaking roots. Of course there was.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I envisaged the tree then I imagined an invisible rope connecting my body to it. Straining my mind, I tugged on the rope. Nothing happened. I tugged again, feeling something uncoil inside me. It was going to work. I knew it.

Then an arm went around me.

‘Foolish woman,’ Monroe hissed in my ear. He yanked me backwards while I pulled the dead weight of the man. A moment later, we were all back on dry ground.

I gasped, wheezed and wiped my eyes with the back of hand. I crawled to the man and tilted his head back to begin chest compressions. My lungs hurt, however, and I wasn’t sure I’d have the breath or the energy to revive him. I blinked away hot tears. Monroe pushed me out of the way.

I fell backwards, watching him with my heart in my mouth. ‘You can do it,’ I whispered. ‘Breathe. breathe.’

There was a spluttering wheeze before a considerable amount of water dribbled out of the man’s mouth. Relief washed over me. He was going to be alright. He was going to make it. He was…

Something wrapped round my stomach and squeezed it tightly. I just had time to glance down and see the slimy tentacle with its massive suckers before I was hauled off my feet back into the water. Shit.

I writhed and fought, pushing against the monster’s grip, doing everything I could to wiggle free. Its suckers were too powerful; however much I pushed and shoved, I couldn’t budge them. I raised my hands to try a burst of uncontrolled magic but, before I could, I was submerged back into the murky canal.

I swallowed several mouthfuls of water. The tentacle lifted me upwards again, allowing me to heave in some much-needed oxygen, but my relief was short-lived. The creature transferred me from its snaking arm to its massive mouth. Sharp teeth pinched my torso. The worst thing was that I knew it wasn’t even biting down hard, not yet anyway. This bastard was enjoying playing with its food.

Unwilling to wriggle too much and end up completely skewered, I forced myself to fall limp. Playing dead was the best strategy I could think of. It worked for possums; there was no reason why it couldn’t work for me, at least temporarily.

I racked my brains for a sensible way out. There had to be some way to get the monster to release me.

I squinted to my left and spotted the bridge up ahead while the slimy fucker tossed its head from side to side in predatorial triumph. Monroe was busy – or so I hoped – getting the poor victim on the bank to breathe. But there were other ways to encourage the beast to move to where I wanted. Whatever this thing was, it was new to the area. I had to gamble that it hadn’t yet learnt that cars weren’t for munching on.

I’d almost managed it with the tree; if Monroe hadn’t interrupted, I might have succeeded. All I had to do was replicate the same manoeuvre – sort of – with the barely visible Jeep that was sitting on the bridge above us. I could the see the top of its roof from over the barrier.

This would work, I decided. This would definitely work.

Closing one eye, because for some reason that seemed to make sense, I honed in on the Jeep and willed it to move. Something tugged deep in my stomach and I thought I had it for sure – but then the bastard slime monster from the deep decided to toss me up in the air and catch me again in its foul mouth. It had rotten table manners and quite possibly the worst case of halitosis I’d ever come across. Bad breath appeared to be a common trait amongst magical beasts.

I shook myself. Focus. I had to focus.

I turned my head. The monster was positioned at a different angle, meaning that I was too. The Jeep had vanished from my vision, obscured by the barriers on the bridge. I hissed under my breath, causing the creature to