Kiss Me Deadly: Tales of a Paranormal Romance

“I mean ... really lost.” His eyes searched my face. “So lost you don’t know if you’ll ever find your way back ... or forward. You don’t know where you are. You don’t know where you’re supposed to be. It’s like the universe misplaced you and then forgot you ever existed.”

“It sounds terrible,” I said, “and lonely.”

Josh touched my wrist. “But you were there.” His voice was a rasp. “You were there,” he said again, a touch of awe in his voice, “and you found me.”

I’ve always been good at finding lost things.

Now, in the abandoned white house that no longer felt so ... abandoned, I sifted through the mess of apples until I found the one pomegranate, hiding at the bottom of the bowl. I’d brought a knife for this purpose. I sliced the fruit open and picked out six seeds.

I would live in my world and be a writer, and I would also live in Haiden’s world and be Persephone. I swallowed the seeds one after the other.

“Haiden,” I said, “Haiden.”

I could feel him somewhere close, and drawing closer. I was ready. I stood there and waited.

The Spy Who Never Grew Up BY SARAH REES BRENNAN

There is a magic shore where children used to beach their coracles every night.

The children have stopped coming now, and their little boats are tipped over on their sides, like the abandoned shells of nuts eaten long ago. The dark sea rushes up to the pale beach and just touches the crafts, making them rattle together with a sound like bones.

You and I cannot reach that shore again. We’ve forgotten everything. Even the sound of the waves and the mermaids singing.

But the men in Her Majesty’s Secret Service can go anywhere.

* * *

The submarine drifted to a stop not far from the island, its periscope breaking the surface of the water like the lifted nose of an inquisitive pointer dog. After a few minutes, a man emerged from the submarine and got into a boat, one not at all like the children’s boats arrayed on the shore.

When the boat sliced through water to white sand, the man stepped out of it.

They had given him a number and taken away his name. Unfortunately for him, his number was 69.

This was a subject of many tasteless jokes in the Service, but nobody would have known that from 69’s serious face and his extremely dapper black suit.

He took a few purposeful steps along the shore to the forest, then looked down. Under his feet, and under a layer of the black grease of age and filth, were pebbles like jewels and children’s toys and human bones.

There was a barely perceptible shift in the air before his face, but the men and women in Her Majesty’s Secret Service are extremely highly trained. 69 looked up.

The boy before him was beautiful in a slightly terrible way, like a kiss with no innocence in it.

More to the point, he was holding a sword as if he knew how to use it, and floating about a yard above the ground.

“Dark and sinister suit,” said the boy. “Have at thee.”

“I am afraid I do not have time to indulge you,” 69 said. “I am here on a mission from her Majesty.”

“Ah,” said the boy, tilting his chin. “I know it well.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“The Majesty,” the boy said, waving his sword vaguely. “Belonging to ... Her. I know all about it.”

“Her Majesty the Queen,” 69 said, with a trifle more emphasis than was necessary.

“I knew that,” the boy informed him.

“She feels that the Service has a need for a man—”

The boy hissed like a vampire exposed to sunlight, lifting his free arm as if to protect himself from the word. Man.

“Excuse me. A boy of your special talents,” 69 said smoothly. He had been raised in diplomatic circles.

The boy spun around in a circle, like a ballerina with a sword in zero gravity.

“My talents are special! So awfully special!”

“Indeed,” said 69. His countenance remained unchanged. 69 was very highly trained, and also a gifted amateur poker player. “And the Queen needs—someone of such talents for a job.”

The boy started to laugh, a high lovely laugh that wavered between a baby’s gurgle and the peal of bells. It did not sound quite sane.

“A job?” he asked. “Make a man of me, will you? Oh no, oh no. You sailed your boat to the wrong shore.” He made a quick, deadly gesture with his small sword to the island around them, the dark stones and trees with branches like bared claws. “This is no place for men.”

“So I see,” said 69. “And I see there is nobody here who would be brave enough to risk all for her Her Majesty’s sake: nobody who is enough of a patriot to die for their country.”

Peter was not entirely sure what a “patriot” was, but he would have scorned to betray this fact. He did not even acknowledge it to himself, really: Peter’s thoughts always move like a stone on water, skipping and skimming along the surface until they hit a certain spot.

69 had turned toward the sea, but he was not entirely surprised when a sword landed, light as a very sharp butterfly’s wing, on his shoulder.

He turned back to meet the sight of the lovely, terrible smile.

“To die for your country,” said Peter. “Would that be an awfully big adventure?”

* * *

The party was a very glamorous affair, with chandeliers like elaborate ice sculptures and ice sculptures like elaborate chandeliers. This created an effect of very tasteful strobe lights playing on the discreet black clothing of the guests.

A suspiciously nondescript man paused on his voyage over the glowing floor to speak to a lady. She was wearing a dress more daring than any of the party dresses around her, and very striking lipstick.

They were, of course, both spies.

“Who are you hunting today?”

“Oh, the English, of course,” said the lady. She did not turn her T s into Z s except when playing certain roles, but her faint accent was nevertheless very Russian. “Look at their latest golden boy.”

She laid a certain emphasis on the word boy.

Let us play I Spy, and follow the spies’ line of vision to the bar where a boy was leaning. He wore a black suit like every other suit in the room, tailored to discreet perfection.

The look was rather spoiled by the knotted dead leaf he was wearing as a bowtie.

The Russian spy detached from her companion and came over to the bar, slinking like a panther in an evening gown. Which is to say, with some suggestion that the evening gown might be torn off at any moment.

She offered the boy her hand. “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.”

The lady noted his wary look, and told herself that no matter how young he seemed, he was obviously a true professional. She was not to know this was how Peter regarded all grown-ups.

“Ivana,” she murmured, which I must tell you was a fib.

“The name’s Pan,” said Peter, who I must admit was showing off. “Peter Pan.”

Neither of them was really on their best behavior. Spies rarely are.

“What will you have?” asked the bartender.

“Martini,” said Ivana. “Shaken, not stirred.”