Sarwat Chadda - Devil’s Kiss

‘This is no time for cowardice,’ he snapped back.

Billi stared into his eyes, blazing blue, and she couldn’t hold his gaze. He was stupid, but he was right. She pointed up the stairs. ‘Get Percy.’ Then she creaked the door open. ‘I’ll look.’

‘Be careful,’ he said.

Oh, he cares now, Billi thought.

It was cold, much colder than it should have been. It wasn’t like the heating had failed; it was like someone had left a fridge door open. Frosty mist formed out of her mouth. She didn’t need to be an Oracle to know something was way wrong. Most of the lights along the corridor were out, so she moved slowly, keeping low and her stance wide. Her skin prickled as she passed along the silent route. Ahead was a pair of partially opened double doors. The sign above read: PICU.

Paediatric Intensive Care Unit.

Where the hell was everybody? Shouldn’t there be nurses out and about? She reached the doors and drew out her a dagger, tightening her fingers round the hilt until they hurt. She pushed the door open with her foot.

A body lay collapsed on the floor: a nurse. A row of deep bite marks along her neck oozed blood made black by the moonlight. Her chest still rose and sank, so Billi ignored her for the moment. Instead she scanned the room.

Six incubators were parked along two sides of the room. Above each was a monitor. Glowing patterns and lights flickered on each screen and a multitude of cables ran from the monitor’s control unit to the screen and to the small body within the transparent box. The curtains were open, and above the fog there was enough moonlight pushing through to give the room a strange pearly luminance. But beyond the cast of the moonlight the darkness was intense. Billi focused in the blackness, fighting the urge to shiver. She stared hard into the inky shadows that surrounded the small, fragile baby in the furthest incubator.

It was as though the darkness around the incubator trembled. Slowly the shadows peeled back like dripping oil, slick and thick, revealing them moment by moment until two women stood in the centre of the room, almost identical sisters. With ivory limbs and curling black hair, they were inhumanly perfect until their red lips parted too wide, almost splitting their faces apart, revealing mouths grotesque with jagged fangs.

Ghuls.

‘Templar,’ said the first. She ran her nail along the edge of the incubator. The baby inside began to cry. ‘Hush now, little one. Soon we’ll sing you to sleep.’ The other giggled.

‘Get out,’ Billi said. Where the hell were Kay and Percy? Billi backed away, watching the two women. They seemed to glide, and each movement was controlled and purposefully small, as though huge energies were barely being held in check.

‘Why, Templar? Why deny these innocent ones our kisses?’ The woman fluttered her hand high above her head. ‘To carry them into eternal bliss.’

She needed to use her wits. She backed towards the door; they’d have to come one at a time. Nothing flash. Suddenly she was painfully aware of the steel in her hand.

‘Don’t be scared – there’s only one of me,’ she said, goading them.

It worked. There were four metres between Billi and the two sisters, but they crossed it so fast they seemed to fly. In their eagerness to be first they collided trying to pass through the door opening. Startled by their speed Billi stumbled back before instinct took over. Instinct and training.

Nothing flash. Just quick kills.

Billi jabbed with the blade, making one of them flinch away from the weapon, only to tangle herself with her sibling. Billi slammed the doors shut and heard them crash into the heavy steel panels. She jammed her dagger through the handles and ran out towards the staircase door, not daring to look over her shoulder. She was so close.

It flew open. Percival grabbed her and pulled her in, almost ripping her arm off. She just had a chance to glimpse her dad, arm slung over Kay, already half a level below her when something crashed into her back, hurling her into the steel banisters and smashing the air out of her lungs. She slipped to the ground and all she could see was a tangle of legs and limbs as Percival grappled with one of the sisters. The woman screamed and clawed and snarled. She looked so slight and frail against the giant Ghanaian, but her blows sent Percival reeling. One punch caught him in the temple and he stumbled down the stairs, legs loose and wobbling. He still held on to the woman’s arm, and Billi couldn’t believe she didn’t fall, instead she balanced at the top of the stairs, feet braced against Percival’s weight.

Billi kicked out, sweeping the woman’s legs away. She half turned, grabbed at the banister rail and missed.

The ghul screamed as she fell down the five levels of the stairwell. She turned over and over, arms wheeling madly and legs kicking. Billi watched in horror as the woman tumbled like a doll and smashed on to the bare concrete twenty metres below. She lay there, terribly still. Her beautiful limbs bent unnaturally. A black pool of blood spread from her head.

Billi pushed herself away from the edge, from the view.

‘Come on!’ ordered Percy. He caught up with Kay and slung Arthur over his shoulder. Billi got to her feet and followed, still shaking from the fight. The others were already well ahead of her.

She heard the door at the bottom of the stairs slam open.

‘Billi!’ shouted Kay from ahead. Billi dropped to the ground floor to see him run out into the car park. She was a few paces behind, but she couldn’t leave, not yet.

She couldn’t help it – she had to look.

The landing light shone cruelly bright on the woman’s shattered body. Her torso and limbs were grotesquely twisted and distorted. Her face was turned away, but her hair was a black sodden mess. Billi covered her mouth to hold down the bile.

Then the woman’s hand twitched. There was a sickening sucking as she turned her crushed and blackened face towards Billi. The woman’s face twisted into a grin. A few teeth fell out.

‘Praise God!’ she croaked through a crushed windpipe. Billi screamed and ran.

Outside Kay was dropping her dad in the back seat then diving in after him. Percival crossed over in front and waved frantically at her. ‘Get a move on!’

She shoved the door shut behind her, then saw an abandoned trolley nearby. She pulled it against the door, tipped it over and wedged it in place. She turned.

They came out of the mists. Ripples of fog broke apart and they crept towards the car. Five, six, a couple near the gate, she couldn’t tell how many. They didn’t rush, didn’t shout or yell, just approached with steady confidence, their fierce eyes glowing with some atavistic killer’s desire. Just glancing at them, they could have been anyone off the street. Except…

Except for their predatory grace and their too-wide hungry smiles. Despite the darkness, they seemed lit from some unearthly source.

Billi lowered her head and raced towards the others. The engine revved and she dived in through the passenger door. Percy shoved the gears and the wheels screamed as he squeezed the pedal down. In the furious glare of the headlights she saw the strange figures step warily apart as Percy put his palm on the hand brake.

‘Let’s go.’ He pressed the release.

The car rocked, just gently. A pair of bare white feet landed softly on the bonnet, and a silhouette covered the front windscreen as a large dark coat spread over them. A sliver of light caught the bright, terrible edge of a broad-sword, one with a hacking blade and so familiar, then the windscreen shattered.

Billi screamed and threw her arms over her head as glass exploded over her. The car juddered and she felt something splash her face. She kept her eyes shut while the last few shards fell free, and the car stopped as the pressure slipped off the accelerator.