Coldbrook(114)

‘No,’ she said. ‘Oh, you bitch.’ She glimpsed the satphone on the floor by the door. She’d thought it was safe in her pocket but it must have dropped out during her tussle with Moira. All she had to do now was reach it.

It took a couple of minutes to slip from the blood-drenched chair and move across to the phone. The wound hurt like f*ckery, but Holly reached the door without fainting. She leaned against the wall and slid down it slowly, dropping to the floor and crying out as the wound flexed. Blood pulsed over her hand. Got to keep still for a while, let the bleeding ease.

She dialled Vic, suddenly desperate to hear his voice, to hear any voice. From the corner of her eye she glimpsed movement on the screens again, but this time she didn’t look. The idea of seeing this blasphemous mockery of death made her feel sick – she might be dead soon herself. But she had plenty of fight in her yet, and a powerful rage against Drake and Moira. And if Jonah—

‘Jonah!’ Vic’s voice said. ‘Jesus Christ, where the f*ck have you been?’

‘Don’t blaspheme,’ Holly said, smiling despite herself.

‘Holly . . .’ Vic said. She could hear background noise, wondered how close they were. They should have arrived by now, surely?

‘They tell me Jonah’s dead,’ Holly said.

‘What?’

‘He went through with Drake. They left a woman with me to fix up Coldbrook. She’s called Moira. And she told me they’re using Jonah to hit back at the Inquisitors.’

‘The what? Holly, I don’t know what you’re—’

‘Moira left, and she let furies out on her way. It’s not safe down here any more, Vic. They’re loose in Coldbrook, and I’m not sure I can . . .’ She sobbed.

‘How many are there?’ he asked.

‘I don’t know. Two, at least.’

‘We crashed,’ Vic said, lowering his voice. ‘Pilot died, but the rest of us are okay. We’ve picked up a car and we’re driving to you through the mountains.’

‘How far away?’

‘Hundred miles. Bit less.’

‘Right,’ Holly said. Right, a hundred miles, a few hours barring any hold-ups. ‘Okay. Can you get back into Coldbrook the same way you got out?’

‘I think that’s for you to tell me.’

‘You still have the immune girl, and Jonah’s friend?’ she asked.

‘Yeah,’ Vic said. ‘But he says it won’t be—’

‘Don’t tell me he can’t do it, Vic,’ Holly cut in. ‘We’ve got a chance to stop the infection, and that’s all that matters. You hear that? Close the breach, save the world. The girl and Marc, they’re all that matters. Now tell me how you got out, and I’ll do my best to get you back inside.’

‘What about the zombies that the woman let out down there?’

‘Yeah. Well.’ Holly looked at the open cabinet from which she’d grabbed the first-aid box. There was still a pistol and a shotgun in there. ‘You’ll have to leave that with me.’

They talked, and planned, then Holly stood and ripped off her loose Gaian dress. She tied it tightly around her waist. She used scissors from the first-aid kit to cut off one of her trouser legs, folded it, and packed it hard against her wound, tightening the dress some more. It was temporary, but she only needed it to last until she could find some proper clothing and a bigger bandage.

Then she’d get Vic and the others into Coldbrook, and whatever happened after that would not be in her hands.





5


Jonah stepped between worlds, and from the first moment it was clear that this breach was different. It felt stranger. The flood of memories assaulted him, and he’d been braced for them, but these memories were also different, though it took him a while to realise why. He saw Wendy sitting by a river reading a book, constantly brushing the hair from her eyes. Then she was walking through a small valley town in Wales, a few years older, her hair now gathered in a functional ponytail and her hands gripping heavy shopping bags. He smiled at her and she smiled back absent-mindedly, soon looking away. Then she was in a car, sitting at traffic lights and tapping one finger on the wheel. She stared into the distance, and she was in the car alone. When she glanced his way it was a quick look, something inconsequential, and Jonah wanted to reach for her . . . but these were not his memories. He was seeing the love of his life, but through strangers’ eyes.

The pull of Gaia grasped him as he walked forward, stretching his skin, tugging his hair, and he thought he was trapped in a particular moment, ripped apart and smudged across this veil between realities. And then he staggered forward into another Earth, and the first breath he took cleared every vision from his memory.

He’d emerged into a high-ceilinged, cathedral-like building. Bright moonlight came through a ragged hole in the roof high above him, reflected from what seemed to be broken hanging mirrors and chandeliers. The structure rose and curved inward to enclose him like a giant shell, its extravagantly painted ceiling faded with dust and time. The breach was resting within a circular stone wall. He climbed a small set of steps and mounted the wall, and the true size and grandness of the place struck him.

He’d been in some of the largest and most beautiful cathedrals in Britain – York Minster, Lincoln, St David’s – but this place was easily three times their size and it took his breath away. Birds flew in its upper reaches. Plants sprouted from ledges and cracks in the walls. Three-storey-high windows had been smashed, and where any glass remained it was heavily obscured by dust or mould. He was afraid to move, in case the echoes of his footsteps came back at him. He took in a breath, and let it out again in a slow, amazed exhalation.