My YA Novel was Longlisted in the Mslexia National Writing Competition

Mslexia Magazine hosts a writing competition in the UK for unpublished novels every year. My YA novel Soul Strife was longlisted in the 2022/3 comp. Winners can be found here

See below for Soul Strife blurb and chapter extract.

Sixteen (and ten months) year old Yasha Alukov is bored. Forced to live with distant relatives in a strange town full of overly friendly ghosts and incredibly boring magic users who refuse to cast even the tiniest of curses, life begins to pick up when Yasha discovers his cousin owes a bunch of mobster necromancers a lot of money. Then the dashing Rosharvin – a soulmancer with the ability to control the dead – offers him a deal: help Rosharvin break his shapeshifting best friend, Enid, out of a maximum security magical prison guarded by a battalion of super powered demi-gods, and he’ll help Yasha take on the mob.

Naturally, Yasha says ‘yes’, and naturally this is only the start of his troubles.

An LGBT love story full of crime, misdemeanour and zombie race horses, Soul Strife is the first book in the Seraphim Chronicles involving a crew of teenage delinquents who firmly believe that with great power comes great irresponsibility!

(Sometimes you have to destroy the world to save it, sometimes you just do it anyway.)

Below is an extract of Soul Strife Chapter One:

The grey dead looked at Yasha through the window. It pressed its featureless face to the glass, lidless red eyes glowing. Dark, purplish smoke made up its body, swirling like oil over water. Pausing with spatula in hand, sausages spitting in the pan, Yasha scowled at the grey. It waved at him, twinkling ridiculously long, tapered fingers.

Setting the spatula down, Yasha flipped off the hob – his not-uncle Danil wouldn’t like it if he burned the kitchen down – and stepped to the window over the sink. ‘Go away,’ he told the grey. ‘Whatever he sent you for, you’re wasting your time. I don’t care what your master has to say.’

He could see his own reflection in the glass, stark against the wash of night reflected in the pane. His black hair was sticking up from the constant run of his hands and his eyes, black all-around like all dyet boi, otherwise known as the “god-sighted”, were narrow and suspicious. His mouth was pinched. He looked vaguely constipated. At least he couldn’t see the scar looping around his neck in the glass. He blinked, remembering the bite of the knife.

As if mimicking him, the grey’s eyes flashed in a wink, bright as embers. It was difficult to read expression in a face with no mouth, nose, or human bone structure, but Yasha had practice reading the swirly patterns in the soul vapour marbling its head. He thought it looked hopeful. Lifting a long, spindly arm, the grey brandished a battered bouquet of daffodils in a cone of newspaper.

Yasha recoiled from the window, cheeks flushing. ‘No way.’ He pinched the bridge of his nose and wished Rosharvin Dregovich to the fiery depths of the Pit. This was an all-time low, even for him. ‘How are you even holding those?’ he asked the grey. Grey dead fed on life force. The flowers should be withered and dead. The grey blinked at him, entirely mute. Yasha knew it was shamming. The dead could talk when they wanted.

Against his better judgement, he had to admit it, he was intrigued. The newspaper had to be charmed, he decided. A spell was the only explanation. But where had Rosharvin found a dyet boi willing to work magic for him? None of the community here in Danitz would help him. They were all like his not-aunt Racia and not-uncle Danil; too straitlaced and well-mannered to deal with soulmancers. Especially young, nervy one’s who wore too much green, doused themselves in floral cologne and smiled too wide.

Yasha sucked air through his teeth, biting back his frustration. Pit take him, he wished he’d been born with a sensible bone in his body. Instead, curiosity had him in a stranglehold. He wanted a look at the spell on the bouquet, which was probably why Rosharvin had the grey bring it. Still, knowing something was a bad idea had never once, in his sixteen-and-ten-months of life stopped him from doing anything ever. It surely wasn’t going to stop him now.  

Haunt Anthology – Out Now!

My short story One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth is featured in Haunt anthology from Dragon Soul Press available on Amazon. Below is an extract from One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile teeth.

One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth

They say that in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. But you say bollocks to that, don’t you Cheryl? You’ve never had much time for kings. Nor men, for that matter. And seeing? Well, the blind don’t know how lucky they are.

Your problem’s always been the same. You’ve always seen too much. You see it all. The twisted bodies of the sprites that jump from tree branch to tree branch in a storm. The faces in the wind and the shadows at the periphery of the brightest day. You see the darkness and the darkness sees you.

But you managed. For years, you managed. You were nimble, you were tough; you saw it all and you asked no questions. Monkey sees, but Monkey don’t talk. You survived. You thrived. You were the one-eyed queen in the dark.

You cleaned house for the monsters, learning the lesson of every soul that’s ever been weak amid the strong and the mean; when you can’t fight and you can’t run, be useful. And you were. When wicked old Mr. Watkins guilt came for him, you were there, wiping the tiny finger trails off the windowpanes and ignoring the way the condensation ran like tears.

You spritzed and you squirted, you wiped it all away, but the fingers lingered, scraping invisible patterns over the pane as you turned your back.

When the shadows in the room sniffled and pawed at the smudgy walls, when the reek of ammonia and terror clogged your nose, you whipped out the polish until the room smelled like an orange grove in Andalucía. You scrubbed the walls until they shone like ivory. You swept trapped sobs from between the slats of the Venetian blinds and let them drift as dust to the carpet before you got the Dyson out.

When the cupboard doors rattled in the toy maker’s workshop, you kept your head down and never opened the doors. You never looked into the weeping eyes of all those little wind-up boys and girls with their too life-like faces. ‘Cuz you knew what you’d see.  But nothing gets the stink of evil out of the air, does it, Cheryl? Nor stops fear from leaking into the floorboards or terror from rising up the walls like black rot.

Though you surely tried, didn’t you?

If you would like to read more of my work you can find my horror-fantasy short story collection The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear on Amazon

The Rabbit Hole Vol: 5 Just…Plain…Weird Out Now!

My short story Sweet Summer Swimming is featured in the writers co-op latest anthology, The Rabbit Hole Vol. 5, now available from Amazon and Barnes and Noble in ebook and print. Below is an extract from Sweet Summer Swimming, a tale of murderous jellyfish on the hunt!

There is no purpose, no will. No mind. The jellies float. They beach. They burn and they flounder. They feed and they sink back into the surf. They wait to be called home again. Some have fallen, some have multiplied. It matters not. They are jellyfish. There is no will. No mind. No wonder why.

There is only the tide, the spasm of sensation. The hook and the cry and the flail and the catch. There is the pulse and the propulsion, the sudden arrest, the split and the shatter. The sink and the swim.

They are come, they are go, they know not which. They are the jellies and they are here and they are gone. Time is immaterial when there is only the float.

The tide comes in and the jellies rise to meet it.

Interested in reading more of my weird and creepy stories? The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear a collection of ten horror-fantasy tales is available on Amazon

The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear – Extract

The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear is a collection of ten horror/urban fantasy stories available on Amazon. Below is an extract from the title story.

The Innocent Have Nothing to
Fear

On the way to Debenhams Department store Lorraine saw the billboard. The Innocent Have
Nothing To Fear it screamed all in bold black and white as the bus rounded the
corner into the terminal. Lorraine shivered and tried not to notice the
scrabbling sounds coming from her handbag as Manicure made herself comfortable.

You are entering a Zero Tolerance Zone, public notices warned her as she walked
through the shopping centre. Shoplifters will be prosecuted to the full extent
of the law, another sign in a shop window proclaimed proudly. Underneath the
warning the image of a hand, palm front and fingers slightly spread in the
universal halt sign blazed a haunting red. In the depths of her handbag
Manicure curled into a tight fist.

Tammy noticed that Lorraine had stopped dead in front of the sign.
‘You alright love?’ She asked reaching out to give her friend a quick
shoulder squeeze and trying not to notice that Lorraine felt like granite under
her hand. ‘Not to worry, eh?’ She persevered. ‘It’s just criminals, yeah? It’s
like the sign says. We’re innocent so we got nothing to worry about.’

On the way to Bianca’s Café for tea and cake both women tried to ignore the
handless beggar in the doorway of an abandoned shopfront.

Lorraine had never cared much for politics or current events so it was a bit
odd when she started religiously watching the news and following several online
commentaries about Zero Tolerance, the new initiative to improve British Values
(deliberate capitalisation. These were the sort of values that demanded
respect, not like your common garden variety decency).

‘We need to cut crime dead in the early stages,’ a spokeswoman said. ‘Crime
is an addiction. A sickness that takes the mind one small misdemeanour at a
time. It’s just a stone throw from shoplifting to rape.’

‘We’ve gone back to the Dark Ages,’ an anti-Zeroer on Newsnight shouted to
be heard over the audience booing. ‘What the government is doing is a Human
Rights violation. They are the real criminals we need to root out and expose.’

‘Turn that off would yer?’ Mark muttered. ‘I get enough of them bleeding heart
liberals at work. You know them protesters are using drones to drop red paint
on us now? Don’t know why the police don’t arrest ‘em. I’d sure like to see ‘em
in the chop room that’s for sure.’

Mark smirked but the smirk swiftly
died on his face when Lorraine swivelled
her head around to stare at him with dark ringed eyes. That was all she did.
Just bloody stared.

Read more in…. The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear Amazon

Short Story – Not Like That: A Tale About Food & Cats

‘Not like that,’ Arthur growled as together he and Winkles watched the Woman-Giver-Of-Food, henceforth to be known as Woman, leave the kitchen. Arthur continued to stare for some time after she’d disappeared just in case that improved the situation. Winkles watched Arthur, but when watching proved unfulfilling, Winkles shuffled forward and sniffed Arthur’s flank instead.

‘Oi, watch it.’ Arthur broke off his intense, brooding stare into the middle distance located somewhere between the rectangular door frame and the hallway skirting board and turned back to Winkles.

‘How should I do it then?’ Winkles asked eagerly.

Arthur flicked his right ear. In the room of soft furnishings Woman had turned on the Crackle- Box-Of-Moving-Images. ‘Do what?’ he asked, briskly striking the back of his ear with his right leg. Ahh, that was the spot. But of course, satisfying the itch only led to more developing and soon Arthur was forced to park his backside on the cold tile while he dealt with some troublesome tufty bits in his creamy belly fur.

‘You know what,’ said Winkles. ‘You said “not like that”, remember?’

No, Arthur did not remember. How should he be expected to remember something that happened fifteen licks and several scratches ago? He regarded Winkles with a level stare, still hunkered over his belly with right leg all grand battement as the French say. Alarmed, Winkles dropped his gaze to the floor. Then he sniffed the floor, following a trail that led him the base of the wastebin.

Arthur, concerned that Winkles may have discovered something interesting he was not previously aware of located on the floor at the base of the bin or caught up in the overhanging folds of stinky black bin liner, hustled over. He sniffed the tile. Distracted by either a very small flying insect or absolutely nothing at all, Winkles skidded over the tile and struck the smooth, brushed metal door of the humming monolith that was the Receptacle-Of-Food-We-Do-Not-Get-To-Eat in a determined and forceful manner.

Arthur looked up from the tile, blinking. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Dunno,’ replied Winkles. ‘I’m not doing it anymore.’ He cracked his jaws open around a tremendous yawn and whined, ‘I’m hungry.’

Oh, yes. Arthur remembered now. Food. Woman was in dereliction of her duties. This must be remedied forthwith. ‘Come young one, watch and learn,’ Arthur ordered, marching out of the kitchen, tail all-a-swish. Winkles bounded after him, skidding on the tile and almost face planting the ceramic. Arthur afforded him the great dignity of pretending not to notice.

In the passageway containing the Mountain-Of-Many-Sitting-Ledges, Arthur confidently led the way toward the beckoning welcome of the soft, bouncy human lounging spot with its solid inner bone work covered by eminently scratchable fabric that felt so good wrapped around his claws. He made a mental note to instruct Winkles on the fine art of upholstery kneading at a later date. A note that was, naturally, forgotten as soon as Arthur crossed the threshold and a host of new smells greeted him.

There was the burnt dark beans smell permeating the air and the burned sponge slices with melted oily, creamy good-to-lick yellow stuff on it that the Woman liked to slurp and munch respectively, combined with the smell of static from the crackle-box and the tantalising reek of the outdoors wafting in through the open window, all underlaid by his own reassuring scent, marking his territory in proud pheromonal manner. Smugly, Arthur noted that Winkles scent was but a whisper in the room.

The enticing flicker of daylight shining through the window meant that Arthur was forced to restrain himself with lordly discipline from leaping up on the window ledge immediately to make sure everything was exactly as he left it beyond. This was an important part of his day, the constant inspection of the manor and its environs. Passing birds hopping about the garden needed to be verbally threatened. Falling leaves needed to be observed on their slow passage groundward. Intruders needed to be watched for. The slightest variation in plant pot positioning had to be noted for later, so a considered investigation could be undertaken during the early morning territorial patrol.

But that was later. Now Arthur was on a mission. Woman must be held to account. Stopping with rump on the ground, head held aloft and feet neatly side-by-side, Arthur looked haughtily over the round of his shoulder to Winkles, who looked up guiltily from his rump-waggling wind-up to an attack on an unknown assailant that was possibly, but not conclusively, nothing more than a ball of dust caught in the short fibres of the carpet. Arthur despaired of him. Briefly. Then he remembered what it was he was doing. ‘Observe,’ he commanded. ‘This is how a master works.’

Leaping from a sitting start to the jutting rise of the Woman’s squishy lounging nest, Arthur landed deftly on four paws to announce his presence with a proud yowl. At least that had been the plan. Alas for the grand plans of cats, a cruel twist of fate led to a sudden commotion at the front door. The Metal-Mouth-Of-Doom vomited a deluge of rectangular waste of no particular utility onto the scritchy-scratchy mat that was Not-Good-To-Sit-On with such force Arthur found himself performing an impromptu grand jete very much en l’air and falling back to the carpeted floor. Horrified by the intrusion, the indignity and the noise, he and Winkles took off up the mountain at top speed. To make matters worse, Winkles had the audacity to lick Arthur on the face.

Several wrestling holds later and to the detriment of the contents of an incidental table that found itself, incidentally, the staging post for a fabulous flying leap onto Winkles’ back, Arthur recalled himself. Food. The mission was food. Discipling the stripling’s impertinence would have to wait. The mission took precedence.

Arthur bumpity-bumped down the mountain, Winkles thumping down after him in mournfully inelegant fashion. Returning boldly to the upholstery paradise, Arthur wasted no time singing his own praises. After all, if he didn’t, who would? Woman could not be trusted to know his worth if he didn’t tell her. After all, she didn’t even know he was hungry. Her negligence was truly abominable. Forgiveness could only be bought with food. And perhaps a round of combat training exercise involving the stick with a brightly coloured feather dangling from a string? But first, food. Food always came first.

Alas, Woman was in particularly stupid form this day. Athur endured a round of petting with strained patience, his loud purring and headbutting as he strutted back and forth over the table a clear warning to all intelligent beings that diversionary tactics would only be tolerated for a short time.

Watching the pampering from the floor, Winkles could not endure. Leaping up onto the bouncy cushion beside Woman he lent his own voice to Arthur’s campaign and received a welcome head scritch for his troubles. Arthur was not impressed, but Winkles, drunk on sensation, did not care. He collapsed onto his side and presented his belly, front paws demurely tucked in as his four legs assumed that rarest of moves performed only by cats in moments of glorious abandon known as le grand battement quatre!

Arthur’s disgust at this display of weak-willed surrender required nothing less than a full body leap into Woman’s lap, followed by a quick pirouette and a tail side-swipe to the face. Someone had to take a stand for honour.  Alas and alack, acts in defence of principle were never without risk. Arthur was unceremoniously dumped from Woman’s lap onto the carpet. To make matters worse, Winkles sat on the cushions licking his paw. Arthur’s ears went back, his eyes went wide. His stare promised retribution. In fact, so intent was he in communicating Winkles doom, he was forced to perform a quick pas de chat to get out of the way of the seismic thunder of Woman’s feet.

This was it. The pivotal moment of the campaign had arrived. Woman was on the move! Arthur tore after her, yowling in a continuous stream of complaint punctuated only by his paws striking the floor. Winkles hurdled the escarpment of the cushion nest and bounded after Arthur who made sure to shoulder check the young pretender at the door to the kitchen. Hierarchy must be upheld!

More than the strategizing, more than the feint and the attack, more than the yowling, this was the hardest part of any operation. The wait.

The important cupboard was opened. Bowls were rattled. Plastic wrapped sachets flapped in the air a moment before Woman mercilessly loped off their heads, spilling meaty goodness first into Arthur’s bowl and then into Winkles. Arthur began purring loudly, serenading Woman with his praise. The smell, oh the smell! Arthur was tempted to chase his own tail in pure joy. Agonised by anticipation Arthur and Winkles experienced raptures in the time it took for Woman to deposit the food in front of them.

The first mouthful was life. The second mouthful was heaven. The third mouthful was…okay. Arthur looked up from his bowl and found Winkles watching him. ‘I don’t like this,’ said the youngster.

Arthur concurred. He sat back on his haunches and licked his chops. His mood deflated. Victory, now achieved, lacked savour. How could this be? After all that had been risked and endured, could this cold, lumpy slop truly be their reward? No, something had gone horribly awry!  ‘This is your fault,’ he told Winkles. ‘I said you were doing it wrong. The timbre of your whining has resulted in this poor fare.’ 

Winkles ignored him. In his despondency, he had begun earnestly grooming his belly fur. Arthur watched him for a moment, observing his technique until he could take no more, exclaiming, ‘Not like that!’

Haunt Anthology – Out Now

My short story One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth is featured in Haunt anthology from Dragon Soul Press available on Amazon. Below is an extract from One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile teeth.

One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth

They say that in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. But you say bollocks to that, don’t you Cheryl? You’ve never had much time for kings. Nor men, for that matter. And seeing? Well, the blind don’t know how lucky they are.

Your problem’s always been the same. You’ve always seen too much. You see it all. The twisted bodies of the sprites that jump from tree branch to tree branch in a storm. The faces in the wind and the shadows at the periphery of the brightest day. You see the darkness and the darkness sees you.

But you managed. For years, you managed. You were nimble, you were tough; you saw it all and you asked no questions. Monkey sees, but Monkey don’t talk. You survived. You thrived. You were the one-eyed queen in the dark.

You cleaned house for the monsters, learning the lesson of every soul that’s ever been weak amid the strong and the mean; when you can’t fight and you can’t run, be useful. And you were. When wicked old Mr. Watkins guilt came for him, you were there, wiping the tiny finger trails off the windowpanes and ignoring the way the condensation ran like tears.

You spritzed and you squirted, you wiped it all away, but the fingers lingered, scraping invisible patterns over the pane as you turned your back.

When the shadows in the room sniffled and pawed at the smudgy walls, when the reek of ammonia and terror clogged your nose, you whipped out the polish until the room smelled like an orange grove in Andalucía. You scrubbed the walls until they shone like ivory. You swept trapped sobs from between the slats of the Venetian blinds and let them drift as dust to the carpet before you got the Dyson out.

When the cupboard doors rattled in the toy maker’s workshop, you kept your head down and never opened the doors. You never looked into the weeping eyes of all those little wind-up boys and girls with their too life-like faces. ‘Cuz you knew what you’d see.  But nothing gets the stink of evil out of the air, does it, Cheryl? Nor stops fear from leaking into the floorboards or terror from rising up the walls like black rot.

Though you surely tried, didn’t you?

If you would like to read more of my work you can find my horror-fantasy short story collection The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear on Amazon

The Rabbit Hole Volume 5: Just…Plain…Weird – Out Now!

My short story Sweet Summer Swimming is featured in the writers co-op latest anthology, The Rabbit Hole Vol. 5, now available from Amazon and Barnes and Noble in ebook and print. Below is an extract from Sweet Summer Swimming, a tale of murderous jellyfish on the hunt!

There is no purpose, no will. No mind. The jellies float. They beach. They burn and they flounder. They feed and they sink back into the surf. They wait to be called home again. Some have fallen, some have multiplied. It matters not. They are jellyfish. There is no will. No mind. No wonder why.

There is only the tide, the spasm of sensation. The hook and the cry and the flail and the catch. There is the pulse and the propulsion, the sudden arrest, the split and the shatter. The sink and the swim.

They are come, they are go, they know not which. They are the jellies and they are here and they are gone. Time is immaterial when there is only the float.

The tide comes in and the jellies rise to meet it.

Interested in reading more of my weird and creepy stories? The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear a collection of ten horror-fantasy tales is available on Amazon

The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear – Available Now

The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear and Other Stories of Chilling Modern Horror Fantasy is a collection of ten Urban Fantasy/Horror short stories. It is available to buy on Amazon here

In a dystopian Britain, Lorraine has a severed hand problem. A trip to the woods turns to tragedy for Bethany and a deal with a love-struck demon goes awry for Chris. This is just a taste of the ten short stories of urban fantasy and horror gathered here. Spotlighting a strange and twisted suburban world, where a P.A’s unrequited love for the new girl in the office attracts a nightclub genie, vampires contract with the local cleaning service for discreet stain removal and everything and nothing is as it seems. Each self-contained story provides humour with a bite and chills with a smile focusing on the lives of normal people in an abnormal world where no one is entirely innocent and everyone has something to fear.

Short Story – In Our Hour Of Need

‘Chris, there’s a man outside the house.’ Ruth turned to him, letting the curtain drop closed. She was illuminated by the streetlight right outside the house, limned in an infernal orange glow. Her angled cheekbones were pulled into sharp relief, mouth pulled into a moue of suspicion. The effect was cadaverous as she’d yet to regain the weight she’d lost while Joey was in the hospital.

            Chris rose from his side of the bed cautiously and took Ruth’s place at the window. He peeled back the thin fabric. Ruth was right. There was a man outside the house. He stood in the middle of the streetlight’s pool, hands resting on the Adebayo’s gate. Despite being spotlighted by the streetlight Chris could not make out the man’s features. He was draped in indistinct shadow like it was his personal camouflage.

Chris hurriedly turned away. ‘It’s nothing. Just someone waiting for a taxi or something,’ he told his wife.

Ruth had never been a fool. She sat on the bed arms crossed, a frown just visible in the dim light. ‘You should go down there. You know we’ve had weirdos hanging around the house since that thing with the papers.’

‘It’s two in the morning,’ Chris protested. ‘I’m not going down there in my jammies. It’s not like it’s a crime to stand on the street.’

‘What if he’s a paparazzi or something?’ Ruth insisted. ‘He could be trying to break in.’

Chris scoffed. ‘Make up your mind. Either he’s a pap or a burglar, he can’t be both.’

‘Go down there, Chris.’ Ruth’s tone brooked no argument. Chris still tried, opening his mouth to object further. ‘I mean it,’ Ruth cut him off before he could finish drawing breath. ‘I’m worried about Joey. We just got him back, and you know he’s been sleeping funny since getting out of the hospital.

Joey. The papers called him a miracle child. Waking up from a coma when the doctors said he was brain-dead. Walking and talking and acting like the normal, happy kid he’d been before the hit-and-run.

Chris’s shoulders slumped and his spine depressed. It always came down to Joey, didn’t it? He was the cause that kept Chris and Ruth together and the wedge that kept them apart. Joey had supplanted the love the couple had for each other, taking all the love for himself. He was their little miracle, the son granted to them after two courses of IVF, and some bastard in a stolen sports car had almost taken him away from them.

He’d hit his head on the car’s bonnet, the doctors said and then been tossed into the air, hitting his head again on the road when he landed. Massive head trauma. Bleeding on the brain. They’d cracked his skull open to staunch the bleeding and release the pressure –and god bless the NHS – they’d saved his body, but Chris’ beautiful boy had been a vegetable. Dead inside, his spirit already in heaven.

And then, in the eleventh hour, when the doctors were ready to pull the plug, Joey woke up. He looked right at Chris and smiled and said “Dad.”

No wonder the tabloids thought it was a miracle. It should be a miracle. A little whisper of God’s grace in this crappy world. That’s what pastor Evans called it during that first service they took Joey to after his discharge. But it wasn’t a miracle and Chris was the only one who knew that.

Joey’s survival was the result of a bargain and the man outside the house was here to collect on it.

Chris rubbed his mouth, feeling shaky. ‘Alright,’ he said heavily. ‘I’ll just go check on Joey.’ Say goodbye, he meant. Chris didn’t know what would happen. The man was early. He wasn’t supposed to collect for years yet. That was the deal, but Chris could hardly act surprised that a man like him would play dirty.

‘Chris?’ Ruth’s voice stopped him at the threshold of their bedroom.

‘Yeah?’

She had a funny look on her face, the bright glare of the streetlight they’d both become used to over the years, painted half her face in light and the rest in darkness. The wet gleam of her slightly protuberant eyes was very bright. ‘Nothing,’ she said, ‘Just…remember that I love you, alright? I just need to do what’s best for Joey, yeah?’

‘Yeah, of course,’ Chris said confused because Ruth sounded upset. ‘That’s what I want too.’ If Ruth knew what he’d bargained for Joey’s health she’d never doubt that, he thought. But he couldn’t tell her. That had been part of the deal. Tell no one. Not that Chris had been all that eager to tell anyone anyway. They’d ever think he was nuts, the grief sending him over the edge, or they’d believe him and Chris didn’t want to think about what Pastor Evans would do if he knew.

Ruth’s smile was tremulous, the wet gleam of her eyes still off-putting. ‘Good,’ she said shakily. ‘I’m glad you understand.’

Chris didn’t understand but he went anyway because he was a man who paid his debts.

Joey waw sleeping soundly, proof that Ruth worried too much sometimes. His bedside table was cluttered with “Get Well” cards and X-Box vouchers or whatever those things were called. Chris picked his way across his son’s bedroom floor, avoiding the clutter so he could lean down and whisper his name.

‘Joey?’

Joey mumbled something in his sleep and turned over, ironically turning his back on his father. Chris swallowed a nervous chuckle and reached down to brush his hand over his son’s soft short-cropped hair.

‘Love you, Joey,’ he whispered turning and leaving the room as silently as a ghost.

The feeling of being a condemned man continued on his way to the front door; the stairs did not creak underfoot, the cat did not stir in the hallway as he passed. The latch turned smoothly first time as Chris opened the door.

The man –call me Steve, he’d said the first time they’d met in the hospital cafeteria – was waiting for him. ‘Mr Adebayo,’ he nodded deferentially and Chris still wasn’t sure if he should be surprised or not that a demon had manners.

He nodded jerkily back. ‘Look,’ he said. ‘You’re early. You said I had the rest of my life before—‘

‘Now, now, Mr. Adebayo,’ the demon raised his hand in a graceful negating gesture, wrist rolling smoothly within the cuff of his fancy woollen coat. Chris squinted but he still couldn’t make out the man’s features or even ascertain the colour of his skin. It was like the details wouldn’t stick in his mind, as if his brain refused to take in what his eyes saw, so he caught movement and heard the man’s voice but lost all the nuance and accent. ‘There’s no need to fret. I’m here to offer you the chance to revoke our deal, without penalty.’

Chris wished he’d remembered to put on his dressing gown. He shivered, the cold seeping up from the pavement through the soles of his slippers. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked warily. Scripture and popular folklore were clear on one thing. Demons didn’t offer get-out clauses.

‘I’ve been watching you,’ the demon Steve said. ‘You’re not happy Chris. Are you regretting our barter?’ he asked curiously. ‘Perhaps getting your son back isn’t all you hoped it would be? It hasn’t made things easier with Ruth, has it?’ he pushed, somehow sounding both solicitous in his concern and avaricious in the way each probing question jabbed at the weak spots in Chris’s psyche. ‘I feel that we built quite the rapport, you and I,’ Steve continued, his voice melodious, twinkling and dancing on the still, winter night air. ‘I really did enjoy our little chats in the café.’ Steve said earnestly.

‘You mean when you pretended to be a man with a dying daughter?’ Chris shot back. That’s how it had all begun. The chatty, sympathetic guy with the dying kid, who seemed to understand exactly what Chris was going through because he was going through it too.

‘Chris,’ Steve chided. ‘Be reasonable. I had to lie in the beginning. It’s been my experience that people don’t take it well when I tell them I’m a demon.’

Chris laughed despite himself. ‘Yeah, ‘cuz you’re a demon.’

‘There’s no need to be discriminatory.’ Steve sniffed. ‘Have I ever been anything less than upfront with you since revealing my true nature?’ he asked. ‘Did I not go through our contract point by point before you signed?’

Chris frowned. ‘Yeah, and I remember what the contract said. It was binding. That means no going back.’ He’d had to sign the contract with blood. He’d almost baulked then and there. But Steve had calmed him down, promising him that a single drop was all that was needed.

‘Come on now, Chris. Wouldn’t you open a vein for Joey if all he needed was a transfusion?’ he’d asked. ‘Signing in blood is, I admit, a rather archaic custom, but you know how it is, sometimes you just have to put up with old fashion precedent.’ 

Now Steve sounded pleased, ‘That’s what I like about you Chris, you’re a thorough and methodical man. I’ve bargained with some people who barely read the contract.’ He clucked his tongue, the little hissing noise he made incredibly sibilant. ‘Those people make my job so distasteful. It’s hardly worth harvesting the souls of people that negligent.’

Chris licked his lips. He was cold all the way through now. His skin broke out in gooseflesh but he didn’t tremble. He was rooted in place, like a rapidly hardening block of ice. Steve had always had that effect. He made Chris forget the world, his physical comfort, everything except the ebb and flow of Steve’s voice. Chris reckoned it was a demon thing. The Devil was supposed to have a silver tongue. It was probably part of demon training to learn the gift of the gab.

‘While it is true that you cannot attempt to renegotiate the terms of our contract, the contract itself does not prevent me from doing so.’ Steve smiled. ‘I really do like you, Chris. Most of the people I meet in this line of work are so dreadfully histrionic and hysterical; it’s quite trying on the nerves. You and Ruth have been so refreshingly restrained in comparison.’

A dart of surprise rocked Chris out of his stupor. ‘What do you mean by that?’ he demanded. ‘Have you been talking to my wife?’

Fear licked through him. What would he do if Ruth found out he’d made a deal with a demon to save their son? They’d both been raised in the Church. What he’d done was worse than a sin; he’d turned his back on God and the church and pledged his soul to the devil when he died. It was unforgivable and yet, he hoped that Ruth would understand why he’d done it. She’d said herself, she’d do anything to protect Joey. All Chris had done was to make sure she didn’t have to.

‘Oh no, no, Chris,’ Steve hurried to reassure him having no trouble reading his fears in his face. ‘Rest assured I haven’t spoken to your wife about our deal. That would be dreadfully unprofessional of me.’

Chris relaxed fractionally, but there was something about what Steve had said that rankled him. Something about the wording…

‘I’m offering to void our contract,’ Steve said. ‘Your soul will no longer be in hock to Hell. Unfortunately, Joey will die, but think about it Chris,’ Steve said quickly, persuasively, ‘he was going to die anyway, before my intervention. This would be restoring the natural balance. And think, you’d be able to see your boy in heaven when you die.’

‘You bastard,’ Chris rocked forward drunkenly, ‘You leave my boy alone.’ He tried to throw a punch but Steve was no longer there. He’d faded away like smoke on a rainy night, materialising a step or so out of reach, nearer to the curb than the fence.

‘I only want you to be happy Chris,’ Steve pleaded, and sickeningly he sounded sincere. ‘I am in earnest when I say that I truly do like you,’ Steve floated across the pavement until he was back to gripping the gate. Wood splintered, flakes tumbling to the ground as the demon’s nails bit deep. ‘I’ve made hundreds of barters just like ours and never have I felt so much as an inkling to void a contract, until you.’ Steve said wretchedly. ‘Is one child worth your life and your soul? You can have others, it is your wife who is all but barren.’

Rage flooded Chris’s system. During their brief association, Steve had been smooth and impartial and easy to talk to, like a good pastor or a really good dentist. The sort who realise they’re in a trade everyone hates and works hard to make you feel less afraid. Now he was seeing the demon’s real conniving nature.

‘You leave my wife and child out of this,’ Chris bellowed, throwing open the gate so he could confront the demon as he danced like mist to the curb. ‘Your deal with me,’ Chris snatched at Steve’s coat, only for his fingers to close on chill air. ‘I won’t let you hurt them!’

Chris swung and swung again. Steve bobbed in the air like some kind of marksman’s paper target, he floated as if strung on a pulley. His form was insubstantial, ghostly, a mirage of Chris’s own making, except for his voice which raised in pitch until it was a near dog-whistle wail of misery.

‘Oh Chris, please won’t you reconsider? I came to you once before, in your time of need and now I am here again. Let me help you now as I helped you then.’

‘You said you wouldn’t come for my soul ‘til I died,’ Chris spat out, breathless and furious. ‘You broke the rules. I’m not dead. I’m not even sick.’

‘Oh Chris,’ Steve sagged like a limp paper bag. ‘Oh, my poor, dear, honourable man. You were so careful to read the small print, you made such a solid deal, I really was very proud of you –but you see, you forgot to ask for an exclusivity clause.’

Chris startled, ‘What are you talking about?’

Steve sighed, his visage deflated, shoulders rounded, he looked like a very unhappy phantom, all greyscale misery in the pall of the streetlight. Chris sensed that his regard was not entirely on him, however. Instead, Steve seemed to be looking up at the window to the master bedroom. Chris spun around, panicked.

In the darkness, bathed in the streetlighting Chris could see only darkness staring back at him from the bedroom window, but he thought he saw the curtains twitch closed as if Ruth had slipped away from the window the instant he turned to look.

‘You leave my wife alone,’ Chris warned the demon, well aware that his threats were entirely impotent, but determined to try and defend his family all the same.

Steve sighed, a long tired exhale, wheezing like a dying man’s final breath. ‘My word to you, Chris. No harm will come to Ruth at my hand or will.’

Chris fidgeted, caught between fight and flight instincts. ‘And Joey?’ he demanded. ‘You won’t put him back in the coma?’

Steve shook his head. ‘No,’ he said sadly. ‘While it grieves me to leave the contract intact, I will not void it against your will. You people have free will, you see. I’ve given you a chance – very much against policy, I might add –but I can’t force you to save yourself.’

‘Save me,’ Chris sneered, ‘You’re going to take my soul.’

‘Yes, it does appear that I will.’ Steve seemed to concertina toward the gutter, folding in on himself until the illusion of a man gave way to nothing but a whisper of foul, chill air in the night. His sigh was another drawn-out death rattle. ‘You had best go inside Chris. Your wife is waiting.’

Chris hesitated thoroughly confused and alarmed. ‘That’s it?’ he asked. ‘No more tricks or surprises?’

‘No surprises from me, no.’

Steve dragged himself up, fluttering to full height again like the hollow man pennant flags that flap about in the breeze outside Gary’s used car dealership, the one’s that always look like they’re battering against the wind as it drives them into a frenzy. Steve was not in a frenzy. He looked, instead, as if he was marshalling his strength to deal with something very unpleasant. 

It was on the tip of Chris’ tongue to ask, after all, if a demon looked that worried something bad must be about to happen, but then he stopped himself. How did he know what a demon thought was bad? Maybe Steve was upset he hadn’t tricked Chris into betraying his son to save his soul. Maybe that was the demon’s nefarious plan all along? Use his silver tongue to corrupt Chris into the ultimate act of cowardice and damn both him and Joey. Yes, that had to be it. Chris was just too quick for him, too savvy. He’d seen through the demon’s ploy.

Buoyed by this realisation and the satisfaction in knowing that while his soul would eventually go to Hell it would do so honourably, in payment for saving his son, Chris walked back up the path to his house with shoulders back and head held high.

He didn’t see the knife at all. Barely had time to register his wife’s presence, right on the other side of the front door. He rocked back in shock, badly winded, as Ruth drove a punch straight into his abdomen. His shock morphed into something both more profound and uncomprehending as he felt a sudden flush of icy cold rush through his body from head to stomach and looked down to see wetness spreading over his t-shirt.

‘Ruth?’

She came at him and this time he saw the flash of the knife, catch in the light reflected from the ever intrusive light from the street outside. He saw the blade arc down, Ruth’s gaunt face, stretched into a rictus of concentration, her eyes wild and wet. He fell to the hallway floor, a line of fire opening up across his neck and down the side of his face. He smelled coppery blood, felt his skin split, tasted salt on his lips. Dazed he grabbed for the knife, the blade slicing his palms as Ruth wrenched it away. How had she got so strong? Why was she doing this?

‘Ruth!’

The cold from outside had never left him, it seemed because soon he was shivery cold all over. Wet through with his blood. Ruth was an animal; she tore at him, punching holes through his flesh again and again and again until her arms tired and she sagged to the floor beside him, panting.

Chris felt very distant, floating like an untethered balloon. He could hear the thud-dub of his heartbeat in his ears. His body was all fire and brimstone but that he felt less intensely, insulated as he was by the core of chill that spread outward from within, perhaps even from his soul.

‘Why?’ he croaked, lips parched even through the blood spatter.

‘Oh God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’ Ruth sobbed. ‘I had to, I had to save Joey.’

Alarm zinged through Chris, ‘But he’s safe,’ he whispered through numbing lips. ‘I saved him.’

Ruth hiccupped through her torrential tears. ‘Yes,’ she gasped. ‘Oh, you are saving him, Chris. Joey is going to live a long life because of you.’ She wiped at her eyes, smearing Chris’ blood all over her face. ‘I’m sorry I have to kill you, but see, it had to be one of us. That was the deal.’ She looked wretched. ‘Joey needs his mum, don’t he?’

 ‘No,’ Chris tried to pull himself up, but his limbs were heavy and wouldn’t listen. ‘No, tell me you didn’t—‘

Behind Chris, the front door opened. Steve shoved his way in, pushing Chris’ body out of the way as he forced open the door. The entranceway was not that wide but somehow Steve contorted to fit into the space, hitching up his trouser legs so he could crouch down in front of Chris and gently stroke his face.

‘My poor Chris,’ he lamented. ‘You made a deal with Hell. Did you think we’d let you live to see three score and ten?’ Steve clucked his tongue, Chris saw the forked tip flicker over his lips. ‘Now we have your soul and your wife’s. A saint and sinner, two birds in the hand.’

The last thing Chris saw in this world was the knife bright shine of Steve’s teeth, smiling as darkness rose to claim him.

Interested in reading more weird and disturbing horror/urban fantasy stories, check out The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear available on Amazon

Haunt Anthology – Out Now

My short story One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth is featured in Haunt anthology from Dragon Soul Press available on Amazon. Below is an extract from One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile teeth.

One-Eyed Queens and Crocodile Teeth

They say that in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. But you say bollocks to that, don’t you Cheryl? You’ve never had much time for kings. Nor men, for that matter. And seeing? Well, the blind don’t know how lucky they are.

Your problem’s always been the same. You’ve always seen too much. You see it all. The twisted bodies of the sprites that jump from tree branch to tree branch in a storm. The faces in the wind and the shadows at the periphery of the brightest day. You see the darkness and the darkness sees you.

But you managed. For years, you managed. You were nimble, you were tough; you saw it all and you asked no questions. Monkey sees, but Monkey don’t talk. You survived. You thrived. You were the one-eyed queen in the dark.

You cleaned house for the monsters, learning the lesson of every soul that’s ever been weak amid the strong and the mean; when you can’t fight and you can’t run, be useful. And you were. When wicked old Mr. Watkins guilt came for him, you were there, wiping the tiny finger trails off the windowpanes and ignoring the way the condensation ran like tears.

You spritzed and you squirted, you wiped it all away, but the fingers lingered, scraping invisible patterns over the pane as you turned your back.

When the shadows in the room sniffled and pawed at the smudgy walls, when the reek of ammonia and terror clogged your nose, you whipped out the polish until the room smelled like an orange grove in Andalucía. You scrubbed the walls until they shone like ivory. You swept trapped sobs from between the slats of the Venetian blinds and let them drift as dust to the carpet before you got the Dyson out.

When the cupboard doors rattled in the toy maker’s workshop, you kept your head down and never opened the doors. You never looked into the weeping eyes of all those little wind-up boys and girls with their too life-like faces. ‘Cuz you knew what you’d see.  But nothing gets the stink of evil out of the air, does it, Cheryl? Nor stops fear from leaking into the floorboards or terror from rising up the walls like black rot.

Though you surely tried, didn’t you?

If you would like to read more of my work you can find my horror-fantasy short story collection The Innocent Have Nothing to Fear on Amazon