Soulstice

Chapter 1

It had been a simple murder. Only three witnesses. Two were his brothers and they would never tell.

They used only the lightest of spells to lure her to the beach – smiles that bedazzled her more than they should have, glances that somehow made her body feel electric. Her name was Anna. She didn't stand a chance. Not against the spells that Michael and his brothers could draw. Not against the magic of monsters.

Anna had left Bethell's Café where she had worked at exactly 5.15pm that night, according to video released by the police. She wore a cream skirt, denim shirt, and a red dash of lipstick.

The image shocked the residents of Beach Haven. Doors were locked for the first time, but everyone watched the news.

Two impossibly handsome young men left the café walking with Anna side by side. No hurry, all giggles and smiles and her arms wrapped in each of theirs like they were old friends.

That was the last anyone had seen of Anna. Except for the three. But of them only he, Michael, had seen the last light in her eyes right before he killed her.

Chapter Two:

Michael woke with a gasp, his body heaving for air, sucking it in like he'd been drowning. His near naked body was drenched in sweat. Michael padded over to the window and saw the streetlights were on. Everyone was asleep. Still. The ghosts of his nightmare lingered – Anna whispering to him, even as lightning danced on the ocean and wind howled off the white-tipped waves. He was holding her trembling form in his arms.

'P-please –help me,' she whispered, her eyes wide open.

'I'd have to kill you,' Michael replied in his dream, as he had done in reality.

'No. Please. I don't want to die. My mother – Please no...'

'There are worse things than dying,' said Michael. 'I promise. I'm sorry, Anna.'

He had spoken her name. He was good at that – speaking names, and he had shown Anna mercy. Which is how he ended up on a human street, in this town, in human form. Because he had taken her life before his brothers could rend her – splitting her soul from her body.

Anna had died but with her soul intact.

Mercy.

Caelis and Helicon suspected nothing, and that was a near thing. It would be as if this night had never happened.

Rain fell in this human darkness. Michael towelled sweat off his body – his human body. He traced a pattern on the window but once again no magic came. He could sense it all around him, feel it brush against his skin as soft as a baby's breath. He pressed harder against the window with his finger, tracing lines that left smudges on the pane. Why wasn't it working? It was so close. The power of it, the name of it, he could almost hear...

The window smashed under the pressure of his finger, slicing deep into his wrist.

Michael cried out in frustration more than pain. He heard the inevitable footsteps. She was coming.

There was a knock on his door. It opened. The old woman, wrapped in a Mexican shawl slippered in. Her face was wrinkled and lumpy.

'It'll take more than your underwear to seduce this girl,' she said, moving to the window. 'That's the fourth window. Did the glass offend you? Was it their religion?'

'You're a little crazy, aren't you?' Michael leaned back against the wall.

'I wouldn't know if I was, or was I not before you asked?'

Michael shook his head, watching her fingers trace ancient patterns in the air, tasting the magic at work.

His own fingers itched.

The glass shards shivered, then lifted into the air, and with a wriggle of her thumbs they stitched themselves piece by piece until they were whole again, inside the frame.

'Tell me your name, old woman?' Michael asked.

'You are a speaker. Some say you can do things, things that should not be because of a whisper from your lips. I will not be telling you my name – even if you no longer have your power.'

'Why did my father take it from me? Why did he send me here? You haven't given me an answer in weeks.'

The old woman was already walking away. 'Good night, Michael, speaker of names, who was strong and now – breaks glass in his underwear. Don't break anymore windows. Make peace with your life here. It may be your last.'

'I don't need a baby-sitter,' he called after her. The window was perfectly healed.

Michael dressed and stepped outside. Misty rain hung around the streetlights, and the air felt humid. It was the first time he'd been out since he'd awoken to his new life. He knew everything about humans. They were slow and lazy, and less in every way. But they were necessary.

The image of Anna running along the beach as lightning zapped all around her came to his mind. Michael walked faster, drawing his hood over his head. He turned down a side street. He heard rummaging in the hedgerows and in the trees. He didn't need to look. Michael could sense the rats scurrying out behind him, and dark birds flapping in the trees above, squawking and barking until he passed them by.

An itch against his neck made him stop in the middle of the street. He turned slowly, sniffed the air like he used to even though it did him no good anymore. Sound. Music. He looked up.

She was there. Through her bedroom window, she was moving, dancing. No other lights on in the house. No car in the driveway. She was alone, and she danced like no one was watching.

He couldn't make out the music, but his breath died in his throat. He was mesmerised. Deeply. Truly. Completely.

Before he realised it, Michael was at her fence, watching, unable to pull his eyes away. The rain pressed down harder but Michael felt none of it.

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