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People screamed as savage snarls and howls erupted all around them. A black shadow raced through the fog, hideously large with a massive head and shoulders, charging in and out of the mist on four legs.
Ash looked at Parvati, and the old understanding was there. She nodded and disappeared into the fog. He looked around. Where was Gemma? Then he saw someone who might know.
“Jack!” He ran up to the boy, who was balancing a tray of burgers and Cokes. “Where’s Gemma?”
“You’ve got some nerve,” he snarled. “Gemma’s mine and she’s not interested in a freak like you.” He dropped the tray and put up his fists. “Time I taught you a lesson.”
“I so don’t have time for this,” said Ash.
The howl broke in. A giant dark shape raced towards them, its heavy paws slamming on the hard earth. Jack screamed and Ash pushed him behind him.
Kali’s dark storm exploded within his soul, flooding him with supernatural energy. Ash roared and leaped.
He slammed into the beast. For a second he saw burning yellow eyes and long, crooked canines, a slavering tongue. The jaws widened.
Ash instinctively thrust his hand down the creature’s throat. His fingers, locked into a spear-point, tore through the soft tissue, sliced open the lungs, and then tightened round the pulsing heart. He ripped it out before the jaws could close round his arm.
The monster was dead before it hit the ground. It crashed, rolled and came to a halt at the feet of the terrified Jack.
It was a huge hyena, more the size of a lion, with massive hunched shoulders and a misshapen head, snout fatter and shorter than a natural animal. Its pelt was bristling black and spotted and the claws long and curled. Blood spewed from its twitching jaws, washing the frozen earth.
Ash turned the pulsing sac of the monster’s heart in his hand. It gave a feeble splutter as it discharged the last of its blood, then it stilled. He tossed it away.
“You were about to say something, Jack?”
Jack’s legs shook as tears smeared his face. There was a wet stain running down his Levi’s. “No… no… nothing.”
“Good.”
How many demons had Jackie brought with her? Ash remembered three others in the car, but here, lost in the fog, the sounds and cries and screams were all jumbled up and coming from everywhere. A rocket whizzed horizontally across the park, trailing bright multicoloured sparks and smoke. It vanished into the swirling grey fog and exploded somewhere among the trees.
Ash ran along the wreckage of the display frames. The large scaffolds holding hundreds of fireworks had been toppled over. The timers tripped, and dozens of Catherine wheels spun like fiery Frisbees across the ground. Missiles shot off in random directions or just exploded on their frames, setting the surrounding grass and nearby trees alight with rainbow-coloured flames.
A small kid wandered alone, separated from his parents. He still held his sparkler, waving it dumbly while tears rolled down his fat cheeks. Then the fog rolled over him and he was gone. How could it have gone so wrong so quickly?
Where was Gemma?
Ash stared at the horrified faces of the people screaming and running in blind panic. Vaporous smog lay over the chaos. Then a bellowing roar shook the fog, making it tremble and ripple outward.
Ash ran towards the source of the ripples.
A tiger was fighting a huge dire hyena. A grotesque hunchbacked jackal stalked the outer ring of the battle, and behind them the towering bonfire tottered. The wooden struts cracked and the structure swayed from side to side.
And behind the tiger stood Gemma.
She was staring around madly for an escape route, but finding none. Behind her was the inferno, and before her were the rakshasas.
Dozens of wounds covered the tiger – Khan – some deep and oozing thick dark blood.
Khan saw Ash.
And so did Jackie.
The tiger charged the hyena, tearing into it. Khan forced the demon back, trying to open up a path between Ash and Gemma.
But Jackie was quicker.
She sprang a dozen metres in an instant, even as Ash sprinted towards Gemma. Gemma screamed and stumbled back, ignoring the bonfire right behind her, more terrified of the slavering jaws of the demon than the unbearable heat.
“Gemma!” Ash screamed as a barrage of rockets shot over his head.
Like a thunderstorm, the fireworks smashed into the heart of the bonfire. Ash flung his arm over his eyes as the gunpowder exploded with a blinding white flash. He staggered back, dazed, as more and more firecrackers followed the smoky trail into the giant, blazing tower.
Jackie threw Gemma to the ground and stood over the cowering girl, her face a grotesque, unnatural blend of human and beast, long slavering jaws with human lips and eyes.
Parvati ran up to Ash. Ash stepped forward, but Jackie brought her fangs close to Gemma’s throat. Gemma lay still and petrified.
“The Koh-i-noor, and the girl lives,” Jackie growled. Spittle dripped off her canines on to Gemma’s face.
They were maybe ten metres apart, though it was hard to tell with the fog and smoke. Jackie’s fangs were a centimetre from Gemma’s bare neck. There was no way he’d make it.
Jackie’s eyes blazed and her fur shivered across her shoulders. “The diamond, boy.”
They had no choice. “Give it to her, Parvati.”
“No.”
“Give it to her!”
Parvati stepped back. “No.” Her cold gaze didn’t shift from the jackal rakshasa.
Ash reached to the back of his T-shirt, moving his hand ever so slowly. It was dark, the distance long, and the katar wasn’t designed for throwing, but it was the only chance he had.
“Parvati, for God’s sake…”
“No!”
Jackie howled and—
Ash grabbed the katar and hurled it at the rakshasa.
Gemma screamed as Jackie sank her fangs into her neck. She beat the demon with her fists, struggling under the massive, hairy monster. The katar punched into Jackie’s shoulder, and Jackie released her to howl again. She stumbled back, and Ash charged.
The rakshasa shook herself, trying to dislodge the katar wedged just below her lower neck. The blade refused to shift, so finally Jackie leaped into the fog, fangs and fur soaked with blood, her mad, howling laughter echoing in her wake, Parvati sprinted after her.
Ash fell to his knees beside Gemma.
“Gemma?”
Oh God, her neck was covered in blood. He put his hands on the wound, feeling the muscles quivering and the breath hissing from her ruined throat, raising red bubbles that spluttered and popped.
“Someone get an ambulance!” he screamed. “Please!”
Gemma grabbed hold of his arm. She dug her fingers into his skin, hanging on to him as if she was sinking into a dark sea, focusing on him with frightening intensity. She tried to speak, but nothing came out.
The lights of death were spreading over her, multiplying second by second. She looked radiant, covered in gold, bright as an angel.
“Gemma, Gemma…”
Ash trembled as he began to absorb Gemma’s