Then, he pounced.
Dot was knocked violently to the hard floor. Two long, white barbs shot out of the daemon’s back and wound around her wrists, tugging her arms up over her head. The scent of magic, cloying and sweet, was thrown over her like a blanket – incense, woodsmoke, gunpowder and something chemical she could not place. Something of the body, almost faecal and rotting, but tinged with the acrid pinch of scientific laboratories and fetid water.
‘Dorothy!’ cried the witch from beyond.
Salamander’s barbs were slimy and strong. They wrapped tight around Dot’s wrists. Dot could not spot Theodora beyond Salamander’s grotesque frame. She kicked her legs and two more barbs appeared and pinned them down.
‘Salamander,’ came Theodora’s hoarse voice from somewhere beyond. ‘This wasn’t what we agreed—’
A thud sounded and the witch fell quiet.
The daemon’s face drew close to Dot’s, grinning horribly. His breath was cold on her skin. Another long, white barb appeared. It slid up the side of Dot’s neck, oozed over her cheekbone and touched her temple.
‘Stop me,’ said Salamander. His voice was low. He was enjoying it.
Dot thrashed against him.
‘How many spells have you memorised,Dorothy?’
Dot thrashed again, her head hitting the wet brick below her.
‘A witch’s apprentice,’ whispered Salamander in her ear, ‘who cannot cast a spell.’
‘Dorothy!’ shouted Theodora from somewhere beyond. ‘Do not use magic.’
Salamander put his dripping mouth to Dot’s ear. ‘She plans to sell you to me, Dorothy.’
Dot pushed at him, but the daemon wrenched her closer.
‘You do not mean a thingto her.’
Dot ripped her afflicted hand free of his grip and slapped him. As her scales connected with his wet body, a burst of cold magic threw the daemon off her. She clutched at her hand, the pain immediate. New scales formed and the daemon leaped on her once more, pinning her down.
Salamander seized Dot’s afflicted hand with one long, slimy barb. With another, he touched her temple, and against it came a hard impact, as if a hammer had struck her skull. Dot’s vision left her. The dungeon beneath the department store disappeared. In tumbled a gentle wind. Gunpowder. Sea salt. Children’s chanting.
She was in the ocean again.
And Emily was drowning.
‘Dot!’ the girl shrieked, but Dot was too far away, scooped up by the waves, beating her fourteen-year-old arms against the darkness. Another wave crashed, catapulting the girls further apart. Dot kicked her legs. Her skirt was logged with water and her shoes tugged her down.
I did it.
I was the one who killed her.
They had been walking along the wooden pier. Dot stepped on every third slat.
‘He’s quite good at kissing.’
‘Foul.’ Dot grimaced.
‘You only think that because he’s your brother,’ said Emily, running her hand along the railing. She had long, pretty, unbitten fingernails. Beyond them, the waves were like great warring beasts, rolling and thundering over one another. ‘He’s lovely.’
‘Not to me,’ said Dot, showing Emily the burn upon her arm. ‘Look what he did to me three weeks ago. I told him he was rubbish at maths, so he threw the kettle at me.’
Emily laughed at her; the sound was a slap.
‘I’m sure there was more to it than that.’
