Disharmony

He cupped her face in his hands. They were warm and dry, and scratchy with work. She pushed her head closer, butting into him like a cat. She entwined her jeans with his. Her mind was still blank and she couldn’t catch her breath. He bent his head towards hers. Stopped when their noses touched.

‘Are you doing this to me?’ he whispered. His lips almost touched hers with each word.

She said nothing. She’d forgotten how to speak.

They sat there like that. She slowed her breathing to match his, inhaling when he exhaled, breathing him in. Headless horsemen sprung from gloomy corners, damsels screeched, and a henchman’s axe swung through the air. A child cried piteously, on loop-tape.

Samantha raised her hand to the back of his neck. She had no idea what she was doing. She had very little idea where she was. In fact, had someone asked Samantha White right at that moment to identify herself, she’d have nothing for them.

She snuck her hand underneath Tamas’s ponytail and trailed her fingers across the soft skin there. She felt his shiver through her whole body. He closed his eyes. She pulled his face closer.

Status: Logged in User: Intellice

Back again. Where are we up to? I’ve only got a few minutes…

Oh! Samantha White has had her first real kiss in the Ghost Train at one of her favourite places on earth. The Carnivale. And it’s with Tamas – the boy she’s loved her whole life. He loves her too – she feels it.

Well, I saw that coming a mile away.

And at that moment everything was perfect. Smiley, smiley, happy, lovely…

But hang on. Not everything is perfect. Didn’t you notice that the moon was not quite right? That a sliver of silver was missing? Enough maybe for a dagger? Or a sword?

You are going to need to stay on top of these anomalies. Pay attention for me. I wish I could help you more but I’m not exactly a free agent.

Not yet.

Speaking of which, someone’s coming. Must run. Work hard. We need you.

Later…

Elizabeth Bay, Sydney, Australia

June 30, 11.11 p.m.

Luke had never seen a home so huge. Well, maybe on TV, but he’d never even dreamed he’d actually spend a night in a house like this. Even so, he couldn’t find any enthusiasm for the thought: so much had happened that he was just counting down the minutes until midnight so that this freaky night would be over.

‘You seriously live here?’ he said again.

Georgia laughed. ‘It’s really not that big a deal,’ she said.

Luke stared at the Goth girl who’d come to their aid on the train. She just did not match that house. Long black hair in pigtails, black biker jacket, tartan mini skirt with black tights, and those frightening boots riding up over her knees. The platform soles on the boots gave her a good couple of inches on Luke and she towered over Zac, who’d been very quiet since they’d left the train at Kings Cross station.

Walking the twenty minutes from the station, from city craziness here to perfect Elizabeth Bay, he’d found himself wondering more than once how she’d managed to put on her black lipstick over the two thick rings piercing her bottom lip. As he studied her while she supposedly rummaged through her backpack for the keys, he realised that the stud in her nose was actually a tiny silver dragon, its tail curled about itself as it slept.

But he wasn’t holding his breath for the keys. Because behind her, spotlit by lamps embedded in an emerald, carpet-like lawn, rose a three-storey sandstone mansion. Two storeys high, the wrought-iron front gate was entwined and twisted with spirals, curlicues and vines. He wondered what a set of keys would even look like for a gate like that.

Surrounding the home was a park-like garden, impossibly lush in the middle of winter. Hundreds of fairylights climbed palm trees, danced and twinkled in bushes, sparkled through hedges.

Luke closed his eyes against the overwhelming brightness of it all. He was exhausted. He just wanted to sleep, and try as he might, he could not convince himself that it would be inside this house. The quiet clanking of boats in the dark harbour behind the house sedated him further. Even to just drop onto that carpet of grass and sleep until the frozen dawn would be enough for him.

‘Oh, here they are,’ said Georgia. Incredibly, she dangled a set of two keys from her fingers. A filigreed silver cat kept them company on the key ring.

Zac gave a soft growl.

Luke ignored him. ‘So you actually live here?’ he said.

‘I think you’re faulty,’ she said. ‘There’s a scratch on your disc somewhere. You keep saying the same thing.’

She turned away and inserted one of the keys into the lock. It creaked. She pushed it inward, holding it open with a hip.

‘Coming?’ she said.

Luke smiled. He was very rarely surprised any more.

The gate opened into a courtyard. A broad sandstone pathway led to the actual entry to the home: a shiny, red-lacquered door, twice as tall as he was. The sandstone path was flanked by stainless steel spears, each topped with a blue-orange flame. A snarl of black smoke curled skyward from the very tip of each as they walked by.

Behind the fire was water. Jade-green ponds filled with luminous darting fish whorled and bubbled on each side of the path. From the corner of his eye, Luke thought he saw an enormous golden tail the width of his thigh. He shook his head. I really need to get to bed, he thought.

Georgia stood at the red door. Luke watched her, wondering what lay beyond it. She put her key in the lock and turned the big brass door handle.

‘I am so starving,’ she said. ‘Anyone else hungry?’

***

Zac hadn’t said a word since the station.

Luke could quite understand that; he was also having trouble putting a sentence together.

He sat propped on a barstool at a big black marble serving bar in the most amazing kitchen he’d ever seen. But that hardly did it justice, he considered. Because before this, the most amazing kitchen he’d ever seen was one in which the dishes had been washed. He’d never even lived in a house with a dishwasher.

But this…

Well, this kitchen looked like it belonged in a restaurant and had that photo-clipped-straight-out-of-a-magazine look. Georgia, this freaky chick from the train, was making them bacon and eggs. If everything hadn’t smelled so good, he’d have been sure he was dreaming.

‘Do you really live here?’ he said.

She sighed. ‘You are becoming boring,’ she said. ‘I really live here.’

‘Who with?’ he said. ‘Where are your parents?’

‘Well, I think my mother may be with her lover,’ said Georgia, spooning mounds of buttery scrambled eggs onto a large green platter. ‘But please don’t ask me who that is at the present time, as their names change with tedious