Fated

‘Alex?’ Luna whispered.

‘Stall them,’ I whispered back. ‘We need ninety seconds.’

‘Verus,’ Cinder growled as he came into range. ‘Should have kept running.’

‘Who’s running?’ I asked lightly. I stood slightly between Cinder and Luna. Lisa was off to one side, looking nervously between us, forgotten by everyone.

‘No,’ Cinder said. His voice was low and dangerous. ‘You won’t bluff me this time.’ He opened one hand, half concealed down by his side, and dark fire flared up around his fingers, a red-black aura that caused the light to dim. ‘You twitch, I’ll burn you to ash. Let’s see you trick your way out of that.’

He wasn’t kidding; in dozens of the futures unfolding before us I could see Cinder lunging forward to do exactly that. But the very fact that he was willing to try something so crude was oddly reassuring – if he had anything else up his sleeve, he wouldn’t be making the threat. ‘You know, Cinder,’ I said, ‘I hate to point it out, but there’s about a hundred people watching you.’

‘No one’ll miss you,’ Cinder growled.

‘Wrong,’ I said calmly. ‘Or haven’t you heard? I’m in demand these days.’

BY BENEDICT JACKA

Alex Verus novels

Fated

Cursed

COPYRIGHT

Published by Hachette Digital

ISBN: 9780748124916

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Copyright © 2012 Benedict Jacka

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

Hachette Digital

Little, Brown Book Group

100 Victoria Embankment

London, EC4Y 0DY

www.hachette.co.uk

CONTENTS

By Benedict Jacka

Copyright

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Extras

About The Author

Interview

A Madness Of Angles

1

It was a slow day, so I was reading a book at my desk and seeing into the future.

There were only two customers in the shop. One was a student with scraggly hair and a nervous way of glancing over his shoulder. He was standing by the herb and powder rack and had decided what to buy ten minutes ago but was still working up the nerve to ask me about it. The other customer was a kid wearing a Linkin Park T-shirt who’d picked out a crystal ball but wasn’t going to bring it to the counter until the other guy had left.

The kid had come on a bicycle, and in fifteen minutes a traffic warden was going to come by and ticket him for locking his bike to the railings. After that I was going to get a call I didn’t want to be disturbed for, so I set my paperback down on my desk and looked at the student. ‘Anything I can help you with?’

He started and came over, glancing back at the kid and dropping his voice slightly. ‘Um, hey. Do you—?’

‘No. I don’t sell spellbooks.’

‘Not even—?’

‘No.’

‘Is there, um, any way I could check?’

‘The spell you’re thinking of isn’t going to do any harm. Just try it and then go talk to the girl and see what happens.’

The student stared at me. ‘You knew that just from these?’

I hadn’t even been paying attention to the herbs in his hand, but that was as good an explanation as any. ‘Want a bag?’

He put verbena, myrrh and incense into the bag I gave him and paid for it while still giving me an awestruck look, then left. As soon as the door swung shut, the other kid came over and asked me the price for the second biggest crystal ball, trying to sound casual. I didn’t bother checking to see what he was going to use it for – about the only way you can hurt yourself with a crystal ball is by hitting yourself over the head with it, which is more than I can say for some of the things I sell. Once the kid had let himself out, hefting his paper bag, I got up, walked over and flipped the sign on the door from OPEN to CLOSED. Through the window, I saw the kid unlock his bike and ride off. About thirty seconds later a traffic warden walked by.

My shop is in a district in the north centre of London called Camden Town. There’s a spot where the canal, three bridges and two railway lines all meet and tangle together in a kind of urban reef-knot, and my street is right in the middle. The bridges and the canal do a good job of fencing the area in, making it into a kind of oasis in the middle of the city. Apart from the trains, it’s surprisingly quiet. I like to go up onto the roof sometimes and look around over the canal and the funny-shaped rooftops. Sometimes in the evenings and early mornings, when the traffic’s muted and the light’s faded, it feels almost like a gateway to another world.