The Book Of Shade (Shadeborn 1) (3 page)

S
EPTEMBER

Study Buddies

The term started with a bang no sooner than the Freshers’ Fair was over. Lily had met a few other people on her floor that were pretty friendly, but she seemed to have spent most of her time getting lost on the campus with Jazzy as they searched for their various classes. They had managed to get singed up and meet most of the different lecturers, techs and professors that they needed to get to know. Under Jazzy’s persuasion they had both emailed their details to the Illustrious Minds to make themselves official members, which meant they were obligated to attend a meeting every week if they wanted to get their free theatre tickets and discounts in the local coffee shop. When she thought of Michael’s cute little smile, Lily didn’t really mind the idea of giving up an hour or two of her Tuesday nights.

As the proper business of actually studying and learning things loomed on the horizon, Lily got an email from Professor Havers for her first tutorial meeting. There was just one other person in her study group, a boy named Lawrence Seward, and they were scheduled for an evening slot one hour before the IMLS were due to meet. Promising to find Jazzy there as soon as she could, Lily took off with her trusty map and found the lecture hall once again. The private door behind the teacher’s desk was open, so Lily made a beeline for it, craning her head around the frame to peek inside.

“Ah Miss Coltrane,” the professor said with an approving smile. “We’re just getting started.”

Lawrence was already at the table. He was the impossibly tall guy Lily had crashed into, the polite one with tattoos on his feet. Today he wore trainers to cover them up, but where his long shirt sleeves ended, she caught sight of yet more lines of black ink tracing up his darker-than-coffee skin. Lily took the chair beside him and they exchanged mutually awkward smiles before both turning back to Professor Havers.

“Now then,” she began, “You two kids have got the best academic records coming into my module, so I think it would be sensible for you to get to know each other.”

Lily nodded, relieved that she hadn’t been bundled in with a moron at least. The professor gave them each an assignment schedule and went through a few particulars of the course that Lily tried not to tune out on. There was a lot of work, but the course was worth half her overall mark for the year. She nodded and smiled as much as possible, hoping to keep on-side with the professor, who would decide whether she actually survived the academic year or not. With this amount of work ahead, the final exams in June seemed a very long way away indeed.

Just when they were wrapping things up, Lawrence cleared his throat. His deep voice had only been used thus far for saying ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ in half whispers, but now he spoke in a louder tone.

“Excuse me Professor,” he said, “but I think I’ve solved your electrocution mystery.”

Havers leaned forward on her desk, pushing her fingers together at the tips and placing them over the bridge of her nose. Her eyes glowed with curiosity at him.

“Oh yes? Go ahead then Lawrence. Unless you too have a theory, Lily?”

The quiver of defeat settled in Lily’s stomach. “Oh no,” she said regretfully. “I tried to look up some stuff online but I didn’t find much. Turns out it’s actually not a good idea to google ‘death by electrocution’ with the SafeSearch set to low.”

Lawrence let out a soft, throaty chuckle.

“It relies on knowing what to look for,” he explained. He turned his gaze back to the professor with a shadow of a smile on his lips. “The natural electricity in lightning and the current in an electric wire are two very different things,” he said. “A person struck by lightning has a different kind of mark on their skin. I, uh, I drew it-”

Lawrence delved into the bag hanging off his chair arm and pulled out a notebook, turning to a page of scribbled information. He laid the book flat on the table for the others to see the pattern he had drawn in the corner. It looked like a plant, specifically a fern, starting with a thick core of lines at the centre and then fanning out into all sorts of little offshoots.

“That’s a lightning flower,” Professor Havers explained, “or a Lichtenberg Figure, to give it its proper name. I’m impressed.”

“So people who get hit by lightning get scarred like this?” Lily asked, pulling the book a bit nearer to see the perfect pattern again.

“No,” Lawrence said, shaking his head. “These marks are temporary. The electricity sort of fries the blood capillaries and makes them visible under the skin. It fades after a few days, when the circulation comes back.”

“Freaky,” she observed. “So that means the woman in the memento mori had a live wire shoved onto her neck on purpose? Because she certainly didn’t have one of these.”

“Precisely,” Havers answered, still smiling.

“That’s sick,” Lily replied.

The professor just shrugged. “That’s the whole of human history, I’m afraid. If you’re going to study the relatively modern stuff, it’s important to remember that human nature didn’t change just because people became a bit more prim and proper.” Her eyes were hooded and serious as she became impassioned with her own words. “All the evils of the human world were right there amongst the stiff petticoats and the modest glances, it’s just that people had to get a tad cleverer about disguising them.”

Lawrence and Lily nodded, both intrigued, but Havers said nothing more.
Guess I’ll have to wait until class starts to uncover more evil.
Lily checked her watch as she suddenly remembered the meeting.

“I’m sorry Professor I’ve got to dash, if you don’t mind,” she breathed. “The IMLS, I just joined and-”

“Say no more,” Havers replied, waving her hand. “It’s nice to see a young girl who reads more than just magazines these days. You go.”

Lily gathered her things and stuffed them into her handbag unceremoniously, whilst Lawrence did his best to stay out of the way of her wild arms. She flashed him a friendly smile as she headed for the door, but Havers called her back just as she made to leave.

“Oh, Lily.”

“Yes?”

“You won’t be going to that
dreadful
theatre with them, will you?” the professor asked, a disdainful look creeping in and pulling her mouth down at the corners. “Only it’s so low-brow, a very unprofessional business, run by rather unscrupulous people, if you ask me.”

Lawrence got up from his chair and he too came to the door. His expression was level, but there was a tension in his muscles that hadn’t been there a moment ago. Lily let him pass her by and he exited with a very mumbled farewell.

“I, um,” Lily stammered. “Well, everyone says it’s quite fun.”

“So is clubbing at Guttersnipes, until you spend the whole next day with your head in the toilet,” Havers quipped, raising an eyebrow. “Do you follow my meaning?”

“Even if it might be good, it’s not advisable to go?” Lily tried.

“Correct,” Havers replied with a parental nod.

A Night on the Town

Lily was late for the meeting by the time she arrived, but it transpired that the Illustrious Minds were a very casual lot; they were sitting with coffees and Pepsis, just having a chat when she got there. She slunk in, attempting nonchalance, which would have been a lot easier if her chest hadn’t been convulsing like a combine harvester after running up the Tower Block’s three stairwells in mid-heels. Lily took in the scene as she regained lung function. Michael was seated on the far side of the room with the redheaded girl, who was talking at him whilst he made copious notes. Jazzy had saved her a seat at a table with Molly and two others girls who she quickly learned were called Bianca and Jess. Bianca, a Chelsea-born socialite, was the president of the society and a third year English Literature student. Jess was her best friend since primary school who had come up with the idea that Bianca was the one destined for the presidency.

“Of course we’ve picked up quite a lot of history students over the years,” Bianca drawled with a false smile, “but we’ve never had an Essex girl in the mix before.”

Lily groaned inwardly, but on the surface she just grinned.

“Yeah, well we’re not all thick tarts, you know, just like you London girls aren’t all uppity bitches.”

Bianca raised an eyebrow at her.
Your move, Chelsea girl.
She laughed off the comment with a horsey kind of snort.

“Oh, you’ll be wanting your tickets,” Jess said, fumbling in an envelope next to her coffee. “We swung by to collect them last night.”

She had a much more genuine smile on her face than Bianca as she slid the two slips of paper across the table. Lily looked down at the elegant gold leaf adorning them. They looked handmade, written in flourishing script that lounged its way across the paper to denote the date and time of the performance. They weren’t like the usual cardboard tickets that were printed from machines, and Lily felt a peculiar delicacy overcome her grip, like she was holding onto something precious.

“Do they really only do one show a month?” Jazzy asked as she inspected hers.

Bianca nodded and put out an emphatic hand to touch her forearm.

“Yes, but it’s so worth it. They’re
artistes
, you know? Very independent.”

To Lily, it was beginning to sound like Professor Havers might be right about the legitimacy of the theatre troupe. Nothing about them looked or sounded very professional, yet she couldn’t help but be intrigued.

“Where is this place?” she asked.

“It’s about a twenty minute walk from Bean’s Coffee Place,” Jess explained, “that’s just behind the Wellesley Dorm.”

“That’s our dorm,” Jazzy said with a big smile.

“We
always
meet at Bean’s at eight-fifteen and walk down together,” Bianca added with another drawn-out drawl, “so
do
meet us there. If you’re late-” She gave Lily a pointed look at that remark. “-then we’ll go on without you.”

“A week Saturday,” Jazzy said as she studied the ticket again. “We’ll be there.”

In the time that elapsed after being given the golden ticket to the Theatre Imaginique, Lily went back and forth about whether or not to attend the show. She didn’t really want to disappoint her most important professor right at the start of term, but then again it wasn’t likely that Havers would find out even if she did go, so long as she didn’t mention it in the classroom. The first few days of her classes on campus were all so boring and introductory that she could think of little else but the folded up ticket in her purse.

If she was totally honest with herself, she wanted to go. Curiosity had had her in its grip from the moment Michael and Molly had put the playbill on the table, but then again all those proverbs about the dangers of curiosity were there for a reason. In the end it was Jazzy that sealed the deal, by promising to treat Lily to a Chinese takeaway on Saturday night if she would then agree to come out and meet the group at Bean’s as planned. Spring rolls and a freak show were certainly more appealing than a night alone watching the X Factor on her crappy laptop, and she agreed with a vaguely reluctant heart.

They were early for the arranged meet-up due to Jazzy’s overeager nature, so Lily wandered past Bean’s Coffee Place to the shop next door. Waite’s Jewellers had a steel mesh over its windows at that time of the evening, but she could still peer through the gaps and marvel at the sparkling goodies inside. Lily hadn’t had a new piece of jewellery since her mother bought her the obligatory golden ‘18’ necklace for her last birthday, but she always liked to see the treasures that she might be able to own someday.

“Ooh I like those earrings,” Jazzy exclaimed, pointing her finger through the mesh at a pair of dangly yellow stones.

Lily scanned along the shelves until her eyes fell upon a stunning golden ring. It was a thick band set with at least a dozen small diamonds, interspersed with another pinky-red stone that she didn’t know the name of. It glimmered in a light all of its own, overshadowing everything in the display around it. The price tag put it at over a thousand pounds, nearly nine weeks’ worth of rent in her student dorm. Lily sighed.

“I want that ring,” she told Jazzy with a pout.

“Then you need a rich sucker to buy it for you,” her friend replied.

Some of the other IMLS members had arrived at the coffee shop, so the girls sidled back towards them. Michael was grinning at Lily as they approached, shifting from foot to foot impatiently.

“Are you rich Michael?” Jazzy asked. Lily shot her a wicked look.

“Only in friends and muscles babe,” he replied, “why’d you ask?”

“No reason,” she answered, turning to show Lily a face that was both mockingly apologetic and highly amused.

The walk to the Theatre Imaginique took the small party of students through a park that was thick with pine trees. In the early evening light of September it was rather pleasant, but Lily was grateful to be walking in a group all the same. It was hard to tell what might be lurking within those branches later on in the night. Their destination, Old Mill Lane, was a side street all of its own, and the single building that stood upon it was the theatre itself. It was a masterpiece in Victorian elegance, all buttresses and filigree, but it had an old grey feel to it, a bit like an abandoned farmhouse in a slasher movie.

The contents of the queue outside the Theatre Imaginique waited with more impatience than excitement. They were a strange mix of the young and old, mostly in small groups rather than couples or individuals. Lily noticed right away that there were no families with children present. She joined the very end of the queue, behind Michael and Jazzy, just as it started to move into the building at a fair pace. As the structure came closer, Lily took in the sparkling golden interior of the theatre foyer, which might have been more inviting if it had been properly lit. Once she was within its doors she felt enclosed by the shadows cast everywhere from little crimson lanterns on the walls. The grand chandelier above the line was dim and flickering. It even swung to and fro precariously, despite the lack of a breeze.

Lily felt a growing trepidation in her stomach as she and Jazzy got closer to the front of the line, until a smooth, exotic voice with a tone deep as the ocean caught her attention. She clutched her ticket tightly, awaiting the sight of its owner.

“Welcome back, Miss Molly, we missed you in August,” oozed the voice.

Lily could see Molly’s blonde head entering a set of red double doors, about five heads away from her. The voice continued in a tirade of cordial welcomes until the heads in front had dissipated at last, and Jazzy was next in line.

“A new patron! And who are you, my sweet?”

The man who greeted her wore a beautiful crimson waistcoat with golden buttons. His skin was a caramel hue, his face adorned with a finely groomed goatee and a moustache that ought to have looked ridiculous. But somehow, with this man’s pearly smile and foreign beauty, it just didn’t. The fellow had stepped straight from the pages of some nineteenth century Vogue equivalent: tall, dark and exotic, and now he was concentrating all his charms on Jazzy, who blushed and fumbled with her ticket as she stuttered at him.

“Jazmine Dama,” she eventually replied.

“I am Baptiste Du Nord, your Master of Ceremonies for the evening,” he crooned, taking the ticket from her clumsy grip. “Welcome Jazmine.”

She went on slowly ahead of Lily, looking back like she didn’t want to head in alone. It was either that, or she was looking for an excuse to stay in the presence of Baptiste for a moment longer. Lily stepped up to the handsome MC and presented her ticket with a truckload of false confidence.

“Lily Coltrane,” she said, pre-empting his question.

Baptiste curled his lips into a smile, and his moustache twitched a little. He slipped Lily’s ticket into the pile and, as she followed the motion of his hand, she noticed a bracelet made of thin, spindly bones hanging around his bronzed wrist. They were definitely real bones, though from what creature, she couldn’t say. He used the hand with the bracelet to direct her to where Jazzy was waiting.

“Go right in, Mademoiselle,” he said with another smile. Up close, his pearly teeth were long and rather too sharp for Lily’s liking.

The interior of the theatre was truly splendid, decked out in red-painted wood and gold trim. It was spotlessly clean, but old and rusted in places and Lily’s seat gave an ominous creak when she sat down where Molly had saved them a place. Michael was directly in front of her, pulling all sorts of sweets and chocolates out of his pockets to munch on during the show. He leaned back in his chair and turned to give Lily another smile, offering his bag of Haribo round to them all. Molly and Jazzy dived in to get a handful of sweets each, but Lily was busy watching the heavy red curtains wafting on the stage. Like the chandelier, there was no breeze to make them shift the way they did.

“You’re gonna love this,” Michael promised.

Even as he said it, the lights began to dim.