I screamed in reply.
Finally, finally I reached the third floor. I threw myselfat the open attic steps with all my strength.I stumbledbut managed to right myself as I reached the bottom step.
“Don’t be an idiot,” the guy snapped.
Maybe he could sense what I was aboutto do,because I heard him put on aburst of speed.
Desperate – the kind of desperate thatscours your chest and leaves you as nothing more than a hollowpulsing ball of adrenaline – I shunted out a hand and snatched afew trinkets off the sideboard beside me. I lobbed them over myshoulder at him.
I heard a few strike him with satisfyingthumps, but he did not slow down.
Reaching the stairs, I threw myself up, the old woodcreaking as if it was being beaten by an avalanche.
….
I did it. I reached the top.
I fell to the side, sweat-slicked fingershooking over the lever beside the stairs that would retractthem.
I pulled it. I yanked it with all mymight.
But he reached the base of the stairs.
And he was stronger than me.
I kicked around on my back, tugging on thelever as hard as I could, muscles straining deep into my chest anddown my legs.
With an echoing twang, the mechanism thatretracted the stairs broke.
I had seconds to roll over and push to myfeet.
He threw himself into the attic, thosecamel-colored boots kicking up the dust.
I stumbled over the chair, slammed intothe table, and grabbed the only thing I could – thebook.
I jerked around and brandished theextraordinarily light book.
Despite the fact my mind was exploding infear, I noticed the book weighed nothing more than a feather.
It looked heavier than a cast-iron pot.And yet, I brandished it with the ease of a pen.
The guy’s eyes bulged as they locked onthe book. “What the hell? How can you pick that up? That’s thefamily contract – only a seer can pick that up.”
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak. Mythroat was filled with the metallic taste of fear. I still managedto jerk my lips open. “Get back. Get back or I’ll—”
I couldn’t finish my sentence.
I had no weapon other than thisdeceptively light tome.
I was dead.
Just as true excruciating terror punchedthrough my heart and echoed like a scream in my mind, he put hishands up.
Gone was the anger and hatred from hiscrystalline brown eyes. His angular jaw wasn’t locked withterrifying tension anymore.
He looked completely thrown. He keptstaring fromme to the book. “Only Joancould pick that book up—”
“I said get back,” I shrieked, voice so cracked and broken Icould barely understand myself.
He put his hands up. “Whoa, calm down.”
“Calm down?!” I screamed, words all crackedand hissing. “You attacked me. Now get out, get out, get out!”
He kept his hands up, his fingers spreadwide as his eyes opened to match them.
Every scrap of anger was gone from hisexpression. Only complete wonder and confusion remained. “You…you’re the next McLane seer.”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talkingabout. Now just get out. Get out!” I continued to hold the bookhigh, fingers so stiff against the leather cover, I could havebored holes through it to the yellowed pages beneath.
He didn’t shift his hands from thesurrender-position. Nor did he tear his eyes off me. “If you can pick up thatbook, then the curse has transferred to you. So Joan must be….” Hedidn’t finish. He couldn’t. A wash of genuine sadness fell down hisface until his lips drooped, his cheeks slackened, and his eyeswere touched with tears.
Yes, this guy had just chased me around witha knife. Yes, my body was still frazzled by the adrenaline of thefight. But no, I couldn’t stop my usually hardened heart fromsuddenly softening with compassion.
Though he kept one hand raised, the othertrembled as he locked it against his brow. “I forgot that, too,” hemumbled to himself.
“What?”
He shook his head and returned his attentionto me. Slowly he let his hands drop. “I’m not here to hurt you,Miss McLane.”
“Bullshit,” I replied, holding the book evenhigher.
But a strange thing was happening. Thelonger I held that deceptively light tome,the lighter I began to feel. For something invisible andindescribable was shifting through it and into me.
Magic.
My destiny, in fact.
I blinked my eyes as they suddenly feltheavy like someone had tied rocks to my eyelashes.
Far in the distance, I heard something. Itdidn’t come from the room. Not from the floor below, not from theyard outside.
No, it came from beyond that.
I heard wind rustling through leaves, felt someone standing beside me.They reached out a hand, and I saw a flash of their palm –bloodied, carved with an eye in the middle.
They pressed it against my forehead.
And I, Chi McLane, blacked out.
Just as my body crumpled, and I fell backward towardsthe desk, the man moved.
I felt him wrap his arms around me, felthim yank me back before I could hit my head on thecorner of the desk.
I had just one second torealize one fact – the man’s arms werereassuringly warm and strong as they closed around me.
Then?
I lost consciousness.
I would be a different person when I awoke.For this was the moment when I, Chi McLane, serial liar and fakefortune-teller, would change forever.
Chapter 3
I awoke on the couch in the lounge room.There was a thick crochet blanket on me, and as I swiveled mysleepy gaze to the side, I saw a roaring fire crackling in thehearth.
I heard footsteps from the other room.
My memories came back to me with a crash anda bang.
The knife. The man. The gaffer tape. Thebook in the attic.
I jerked up, the blanket tumbling off myprone body and crumpling into a pile on the floor. My pillow sailedout from underneath me, and I tripped on it as I jumped off thecouch.
I straightened, locked a hand onthe armrestof the sofa, and used it forstability as I propelled myself towards the door that led into thehallway.
I had to get to my car. Had to get to thepolice.
“You’re up, then?” the guy said as he crossed his arms andleaned against the door.
As my eyes pulsed wide, Ilurched back, scanning the room for escape.
The guy simply continued to lean againstthe wall, looking as casual as it was possible to be. “The
