Skinned (20 page)

The man holds up a forbidding hand. His breath plumes in the air around his head as he speaks. His voice is firm and unafraid.

‘I will not follow.'

Now other figures step from out of the black shadows beneath the towering viaduct. The first is a woman with a burnished tumble of red hair like a vixen's tail. She is joined by three others: two men and another woman. All of them are magic-users, all have power at their command. Together they form the sorcerer's coven. The red-haired woman and her companions move to stand behind the sorcerer, their backs deliberately turned away from the glimmering red lure of the Will o' the Wisp.

Its lights cease their swarming dance. They pause before the magician and then merge. As one, the lights become a floating, disembodied head – a head with three twisted, leering inhuman faces. Each has beady black eyes and protruding fangs, a creased forehead and long, pointed ears. The triple-faced head still glows with an ominous red light.

The magician speaks to the three demonic faces.

‘I have summoned you for a task, Will O' the Wisp.'

The head nods slowly in response.

‘
And what –?
'

‘
– What is it –?
'

‘
– You wish us to do?
'

‘The last chime child must be defeated. There must be no more interference with the Shadowing, or with my plans.'
The sorcerer smiles faintly
. ‘My task is one you should enjoy. You are to lure the child to our coven.'

The mortal magician is right – the merest mention of the word ‘lure' sets the red glow pulsing about the Wisp's three ugly faces. Three matching, hideous grins of anticipation stretch three demonic sets of lips
.

‘Seek out the chime child,'
the magician continues
, ‘but do not yet attempt to lead him . . . astray. You will not succeed in that without our assistance – the boy's powers are too strong, and he will resist. Seek him out for us, and we will use you as a vessel by which to work our magic, to weaken and confuse him. And then –'

‘
Then then THEN?' the triple faces cry in frenzy
.

The magician chuckles
. ‘Then you may make your game of him.'

‘
Very well,' say the heads obediently
.

‘
We will do as you ask –
'

‘
– We will seek out the chime child
.'

The magician nods with satisfaction. Behind him, the members of his coven still stand with their backs resolutely turned. So they do not see the demon's triple-faced floating head dissolve again into the three red lights like dancing stars, brightly burning on their way as they sail out into the night
.