‘Quick,’ cried Melissa. ‘You have to invite them in!’
But the Fetch was too fast. Crossing the room in two quick strides, it slammed the door in the faces of the two ghosts. From beyond the solid wood, Doom let out a frenzied howl.
The Fetch stood for a moment, flexing its clawed talons, its alien features settling back into a face that looked like Callum’s, although the fire did not leave its eyes, and in its twisted smile the teeth remained sharp and pointed.
Then it lunged forward with its hands spread, ready to grasp and tear.
Chapter 25
Focused only on Callum, the Fetch paid Melissa no attention. With all the strength in her body, she threw herself at Callum and pushed him out of the Fetch’s path.
It was only a distraction – a brief one. The Fetch turned to follow Callum as he tumbled backwards. Melissa stepped sideways towards the hearth. Grabbing Gran’s mug of cold tea, she hurled it at the back of the Fetch’s head. The mug smashed against its skull, but Melissa might as well have hit the monster with a dandelion for all the notice it took.
‘Rowan!’ Callum cried, scrambling out of the way on his hands and knees. ‘Throw the rowan!’
Melissa seized the jar of hazel leaves and rowan berries from the table. Sensing she was about to attack with something more effective than cold tea, the Fetch turned to face her. Melissa hurled the jar at its head, but her aim was less accurate this time. The twigs and berries flew harmlessly past the Fetch’s face and smashed at Callum’s feet. He grabbed a slender twig of rowan as he got to his feet. It was the flimsiest weapon imaginable.
The Fetch stood still, its head tilted sideways, contemplating Callum. It was utterly unnerving to be stared at by his own face, seeing such burning hatred there.
The Fetch licked its lips and smiled. Then stepped forward again, claws raised.
Callum flourished the rowan, and the Fetch stopped, its burning eyes narrow.
Then it laughed, a hideous gurgling sound, as if its throat were being rubbed raw with sandpaper.
‘Pitiful,’ it said in a hoarse voice. ‘Can this world do no better than you as its champion? A frightened child, cowering behind a handful of twigs?’
It had flinched, though. It had backed away from the touch of the rowan as though it feared it. Callum raised the twig higher, even though it felt like trying to meet a switchblade with a safety pin. If only he had a more substantial weapon.
That was it!
‘Melissa!’ Callum cried. ‘The logs – they’re rowan too!’
Melissa snatched up one of the stouter branches piled in the fire basket and tossed it to Callum. He dropped the twig and caught the branch.
The Fetch sneered.
‘A sharpened lance might harm me, but not that stick. Fight with your hands, little boy, not with leaves and berries! Is the strength of your body mere illusion? Shall we test it?’
The Fetch leaped forward, its wicked talons slashing for Callum’s throat. Callum fell back, lashing out, using the rowan branch as a cudgel to strike at the Fetch. The blow connected with the side of its head and the Fetch gave a snarl of pain.
The instant the charmed wood touched its skin, all illusion fell away. Callum’s likeness vanished and the Fetch became itself once more, the skinless creature of vein and muscle that Callum had first seen in the garden. Its lipless teeth were clenched in fury, the naked cords of its throat tensed for attack. The wide, lidless eyes stared wrathfully at Callum.
With the speed of a striking viper, the Fetch seized Callum around the wrist. It moved so fast that Callum realised all the creature’s earlier dodging and weaving had just been to lead him on. With a vicious wrench, the Fetch twisted Callum’s arm until he was forced to let go of the branch, then brought its other hand flashing towards his head. Callum desperately flung his right hand out to block, but he couldn’t get a grip on the slick surface of the Fetch’s body. Almost carelessly, it tossed Callum across the room. He fell hard against the floor.
All the air was knocked out of Callum’s lungs and he couldn’t breathe. But blind instinct, his own reliable chime child Luck, made Callum roll aside as the Fetch’s talons thrust at his face. A blade-like claw missed his eye by millimetres and scythed open a bloody gash in his skin from his cheekbone to his hairline. Callum gasped, clapping one hand to his torn face, and saw that behind the Fetch’s back, Melissa had again taken advantage of being ignored long enough to seize the poker from the fireplace.
Callum shook his head desperately. He knew the Fetch was too strong for him – probably too strong for both of them together. Melissa’s only hope was to avoid attracting attention.
Iron. Melissa mouthed. It’s iron.
Of course – Callum remembered now that Gran’s iron horseshoe and the rails that reinforced the brick wall were wards against the Netherworld.
The iron poker was not a sharpened lance, but it did have a hooked point for raking coals. As the Fetch loomed over Callum, ready for the kill, Melissa stepped up behind it and stabbed the hooked end into the back of the demon’s neck with all the force she could muster.
The Fetch roared in fury, and whirled to meet Melissa, jerking the poker out of her hands. Reaching behind itself, it wrenched the poker free, sending a jet of clear fluid spurting from the wound in its neck. With one clawed hand, the monster seized Melissa by the throat, hauling her off her feet, raising the other to gouge at her eyes.
Still on the floor, gasping for breath and half-blinded by the stinging wound across his face, Callum’s mind raced.
Didn’t this creature have any weakness, even with a hole in its neck spurting whatever strange liquid ran in its veins instead of blood?
And then the answer struck him. Melissa had known it – that was what had impressed Jacob, the thing that had changed his mind about her and made him decide she might be a useful ally. She had known the Fetch’s weakness – its own reflection.
Desperately, Callum scrambled towards the full-length curtains at the other side of the room.
‘Hey!’ Callum yelled. ‘Hey! I’m the one you want to fight! I’m the last chime child! Let her go!’
The Fetch’s dagger-like nails froze in front of Melissa’s face. She clawed at the other taloned hand, the one that held her by the throat in its crushing grip, choking and sobbing for air, trying to twist her face away.
Callum could only count on having the Fetch’s attention for one second. He didn’t have time to open the curtains. Instead, he swung round and ripped them off the wall.
All the lights that Gran had turned on to guide Callum home were burning brightly – the fire, the lamps and the overhead ceiling light. With so much light focused against them, the full-length glass doors reflected the entire room. Their bright surface doubled the cottage as clearly as a mirror.
The Fetch, still holding Melissa by the throat, found itself face to face with its own reflection.
It stared, frozen, its eyes bulging.
Then its talons went lax and Melissa fell in a gasping heap on the floor at its feet.
Outside the cottage, Doom howled. The noise rose around the little house like a storm of screaming wind. Melissa cowered. The Fetch stumbled forwards, shaking its ghastly head, like a dreamer waking from a nightmare.
But it was too late. Callum was already behind it, hurling himself into a rugby tackle. His body slammed into the Fetch’s knees, sending the monster flying. Almost in slow motion, Callum saw it reeling across the room towards the door. The glass shattered in a cascade of crystal shards, like an icy waterfall, as the Fetch fell through the door and out into the night.
Still barred from entering the house, Jacob stood in the garden, illuminated in the light flooding from the broken window. In his echoing voice, he rapped out a command that rang through the besieged cottage.