Suzanne McLeod - The Shifting Price of Prey

Mary gave me a resigned look. ‘So this guy’s not only a comedian, but a bona fide magician like Merlin?’

‘Yep,’ I agreed.

‘Cambions are demons,’ Dessa suddenly piped up.

We both stared at her, shocked.

‘Half-demons anyway,’ she amended as she crossed herself.

‘Incubi and succubi are minor demons,’ Mary replied in a neutral tone, ‘but cambions, like us witches and wizards, have been classified as human since the Malleus Maleficarum was discredited back in the eighteenth century. Do you want to sit this one out, Dessa?’

‘No!’ She shook her head vehemently and adjusted her stab vest. ‘This is my job.’

‘Right,’ Mary said, after a few moments’ silence that told me, without any need of a cambion’s prophetic abilities, that Dessa could look forward to an uncomfortable chat in her near future. ‘The tent’s surrounded,’ Mary carried on, ‘so whoever’s in there isn’t going anywhere.’ She paused, extended her stun baton with a sharp snap (she’d still refused to give me one, much to my disgust), and motioned to Taegrin. ‘Lead the way, constable.’

Taegrin lifted the tent flap and led the way. Mary, Dessa and I followed.

Straight into an illusion.

Years ago, before the lesser fae sealed the gates to the Fair Lands, and barred the sidhe from London, the Carnival Fantastique was famous for its illusions. The sidhe would take any idea and, using nothing but magic would build illusions so powerful that folk told stories of climbing towers in fairytale castles, feasting in mediaeval banqueting halls, swimming through tropical seas, dallying in enchanted woods, hiking up snowy mountains and many more. Now, with the sidhe locked out, most illusions were cast by half-rate magicians, and were as rough and shaky as the wooden scaffolding their fairytale towers were built on.

But going by the illusion the four of us were now standing in, half rate, rough and shaky didn’t apply. As hard as I focused , I still couldn’t see the tent beneath the magical sheen of the illusionary room.

The room itself was straight out of an Elizabethan-era castle: flagged stone floor and dark wood-panelled walls, candles flickering in sconces, fire burning merrily in the huge walk-in fireplace, the smell of herbs and woodsmoke scenting the air, and a massive four-poster bed with velvet drapes and enough tassels, fringes, and cushions to fill a hearth-witch’s haberdashery shop. And on the table next to the bed waited a golden flagon and five golden goblets.

We were expected.

Not really a surprise considering we were visiting a prophetic Cupid.

Cupid himself was half-reclining on the four-poster, the silk sheets artfully arranged to preserve his modesty. But he wasn’t the stereotypical winged, curly haired cherub of legend. This god of love was definitely the grown-up adult version. The firelight licked golden shadows over his long, leanly muscled and obviously (apart from those pesky sheets) naked body, his hair was dark, sleek and cut short to his head, a mediaeval-looking gold chain hung around his neck and draped down to his navel, and he regarded us arrogantly with cool blue green eyes.

I squinted in the dim light as I realised both the grown-up Cupid and the room looked vaguely familiar.

‘Ooh, my,’ Mary murmured in astonishment. ‘That’s—’

‘Jonathan Rhys Meyers,’ Dessa said, her gaze fixed unwaveringly on the figure in the bed. ‘Got everything he’s done on DVD. I loved him as Steerpike in Gormenghast . But his new Tudors series is the one I’ve been watching lately.’

Recognition clicked. Cupid had cast himself as the young Henry VIII!

And Dessa had the hots for the actor playing him . . . which meant the illusion wasn’t by chance.

Which also meant Cupid/Jonathan/Henry – Hell, I was sticking with Henry; it suited him – had plucked his illusion from Dessa’s thoughts. Except cambions couldn’t do that. But there was something that could. A Wishing Web. I’d never been in one, but I’d read up on them for the Carnival – the spell woven in the web picked up on a person’s subconscious fantasies. The Carnival had approved three applications, all for kids under eight, and they’d been set only to trigger for specific wishes. No one in their right mind would license one for adults; their deepest, darkest fantasies are far too dangerous.

I upped my focus. Now I was looking for it I could see the dark emerald lines of the spell stretching through the dim room in all directions, hidden beneath the sheen of the illusion. It wasn’t so much a web, but more as if thin laser-like beams randomly crossed the room at all angles. Each emerald laser beam bristled with tiny sticky fibres. Fibres that were floating around us like fine cactus spines, and in Dessa’s case had already dug themselves into her skin.

Hence, the Jonathan Rhys Meyers scenario.

Crap. I needed to find the Web’s power source, and shut it down—

‘Ladies!’ Henry shifted one long lean leg so the sheet slipped a couple of enticing inches lower, patted the bed next to him and held his hand out. ‘Will you not join me? Please?’

—hopefully before the fucking orgy started (no pun intended).

‘Oh, boy!’ Dessa took a step towards him.

I grasped Dessa’s upper arm. ‘Oh no you don’t.’

‘Hey, single mum here,’ she growled, jerking her arm back and catching me by surprise in the stomach. I doubled over, wheezing. She packed a punch, even though the stab vest I was wearing took the brunt. ‘I gotta take whatever opportunities I can get,’ Dessa muttered, starting forward again.

I straightened, grabbing for her wrist and pulling her round to face me. Her eyes were glazed, pupils fully dilated, almost eclipsing her dark brown irises, her mouth slack. ‘Believe me,’ I gasped, clamping my hand round her other wrist as she tried to shove me away again, ‘this isn’t an opportunity you want, Dessa. He’s not real. And you’re working, remember?’

‘Who cares,’ she snapped, still struggling.

‘A little help here, please,’ I called, then my stomach sank as I caught sight of Mary and Taegrin. They both stood still as stones, beatific expressions on their faces as they stared up at . . . whatever. Damn it. Mary I could understand, but what the hell was in the illusion that it could affect a troll?

Deal with them in a minute, Genny, I told myself as I narrowly missed getting kicked in the shin by Dessa.

I shook her, hard enough to rattle her teeth. When that didn’t work I called the tiny spell fibres sticking in her. As they pulled out they stretched, spinning out into long thin threads. Frantically, I started absorbing them, winding them around an imaginary spool inside me, determined to contain them before they dug themselves into any of my own fantasies.

Within seconds the last of the threads slid of Dessa’s skin. She stopped struggling, blinked a couple of times, pupils contracting, then frowned. ‘Sorry, Genny. Don’t know what came over me.’

‘It’s a Wishing Web,’ I said, relieved she seemed herself again. ‘Once you’re caught in it, it’s hard to get out.’ I shifted uncomfortably, the spool inside tickling as it tried to unravel. ‘It jacks into your subconscious, and doesn’t stop till it’s worked through your fantasies or the power in the spell runs out.’

‘Clever girl,’ Henry boomed from the bed. ‘But if I can’t have that one, then this one’s just as plump and juicy with unfulfilled wishes.’

The room around us shivered like a dog shaking itself. The Elizabethan look wavered, and rearranged itself into the interior of a rough wooden houseboat. The bed was still there, but it had lost is posts and cushions. The fire still burned brightly, but inside an cast-iron stove complete with piped chimney. And leaning against the wall was a guitar. I recognised this scene; it was from Chocolat ; the film was one of Mary’s favourites. I scowled at Henry, still artfully naked in the bed. Unsurprisingly, given the new setting, Henry had morphed into Johnny Depp, his hair slicked back in a ponytail like the gypsy character in the film.