“Me and Kiera,” I told him. “It’s not funny.”

Sighing, Murphy sat at the end of the sofa and looked at me. “Okay, so I’ve been taking the piss a bit...” he started.

“A bit!” I scoffed. “You’ve been rubbing my nose in it all day. I’m just looking for a bit of advice here.”

“I’m not your father,” he said, holding a match over the bowl of his pipe.

“But I thought you were my friend,” I said.

Blowing thick jets of blue smoke through his nostrils, Murphy looked at me and said, “Only you can sort this thing out with Kiera. No one can do it for you.”

“I’ve tried,” I told him.

“How?” Murphy said, his pipe drooping from the corner of his mouth. “Telling Kiera her butt looks nice in police uniform ain’t going to get you anywhere. She isn’t some old tart you’re trying to get your leg over with. I thought she meant more to you than that.”

“She does,” I said, swinging my legs over the side of the sofa and sitting up.

“Then tell her,” Murphy sighed with despair.

“I don’t know how, that’s my problem,” I said, dropping my head. “I’ve never been very good with words.”

“Who’s talking about words,” Murphy said. “You need to show her, Potter.”

“What you mean? I should go over there and...” I started.

“No, for crying out loud, “Murphy interrupted. “Stop thinking with your goddamn dick for once!”

“How then?” I said, feeling confused.

“How about if you stopped jerking around with all those other women?” Murphy barked at me. “That would show her how much you loved her, for starters.”

“But nothing happened,” I shot back at him. “I went in search of Sophie because I wanted to figure out what in the hell was going on in this new world we found ourselves in.”

“You just don’t get it, do you?” Murphy said, shaking his head slowly at me.

“Get what?” I said, exasperated.

“Why didn’t you take Kiera with you?

Why didn’t you go with her and find out what was going on in this place? You’re meant to be a team, aren’t you? You’re meant to be together.

How do you think Kiera feels knowing that instead of trusting her to help out, you went running back to some old tart who gave you the boot years ago?”

“But...” I started, but Murphy was on a roll and wouldn’t let me finish.

“The first time I met you, Potter, you were in the gutter,” he said. “And it was that girl Sophie who put you there. She crushed your fucking heart without as much as a second thought. She treated you like a piece of dog shit. Once she realised what you were, she scraped you from the sole of her fucking boot. You meant nothing to her. She didn’t respond to any of the letters you sent her, she didn’t come looking for you – she did jack-shit!” Murphy stood up, his pipe gripped in his fist.

Then pointing through the window in the direction of where Kiera’s caravan was, he said, “Kiera’s twice the woman than that Sophie ever was. You didn’t see Kiera go running for the hills when she found out you were a Vampyrus. She did the exact opposite. Kiera came to you, helped you...loved you, and how have you repaid her?

Huh? Fucked off back to your ex – that’s how.

And if that wasn’t bad enough – the cherry on top of the cake – you then go and try to get your leg over with a freaking werewolf!”

“I didn’t realise...” I started, no longer angry but scrambling for excuses.

“Whatever, Potter,” Murphy snapped.

“But one thing is for sure, if you want to get Kiera back, you need to man-up. Stop sitting there feeling sorry for yourself. Grow a fucking backbone and show that girl how much she means to you.”

“But...” I started again.

“No buts, Potter!” he barked, jabbing his forefinger in the air. “The best thing that has ever happened to you is sitting alone just over there, and you’re in here sulking like some fucking pre-teen.” Then, looking hard at me with his crisp blue eyes, he added, “Women like Kiera come into the lives of men like us only once in a lifetime, Potter.

If someone as special as Kiera loved me like I know how much she loves you, I wouldn’t be sitting in here feeling sorry for myself. I’d be over there in her room on my hands and knees, begging for her fucking forgiveness.”

I sat looking at Murphy and felt as if I’d had a verbal kick-in. I didn’t know what to say.

What could I say? Murphy was right.

“Don’t throw away what you have with Kiera, Potter,” he said, his voice now calmer.

“Because if you do, you’ll regret it for the rest of your sorry life. She is a good woman – she’s precious. I wish I’d had with Pen, what you have with Kiera. You’re a lucky man, Potter, but your problem is, you just don’t see that.”

Without saying another word, Murphy stepped inside the bedroom and closed the door.

Alone, I sat feeling almost stunned by what he had said. And only a true friend would have said what he had. Despite his piss-taking ways, I was not only lucky to have someone like Kiera in my life, I was lucky to have a friend like Murphy. Lying back on the sofa, I closed my eyes. I knew the situation I was now in with Kiera was of my own making. I’d been an idiot – a complete and utter nob-head. Murphy had been right; my loyalty to Sophie had been misplaced, she had never loved me like Kiera had. No one had ever come close to showing me the love I’d felt come from Kiera. It should have been Kiera I’d gone to for help – not Sophie. Kiera and I had been a team. Had. That word spoke of the past and it scared me. Would Kiera and I ever be a team again? I wondered, rolling onto my side.

Something dug into my thigh. I reached into my trouser pocket and my fingers touched something made of metal and glass. I pulled it out.

I lay and stared at the iPod with the crescent moon on the back. I remembered taking it from the blazer pocket of Dorsey, who had died in my arms back in the barn. I suddenly had an idea. I hoped it would work.

Chapter Nine

Kiera

The caravan Murphy had duped the campsite owner into letting me use for the night was comfortable. There was a tiny electric heater attached to the wall and I switched it on. I peeled off the police coat, shirt, and trousers. They were damp from the snow. There was a chair, so I pulled it across the small room and draped my clothes over the back of it. I then positioned the chair in front of the fire to dry my clothes out.

Naked, I went to the small bathroom. There was a toilet and shower in the closet-sized room. Good enough. I just wanted to feel clean again. I ran the water until steam was pouring from the showerhead and had covered the mirror fixed to the wall. There was a small complimentary bottle of shower gel and shampoo sitting in a soap dish attached to the shower wall.

I stood under the water and let it wash over my body. My skin tingled and my long, black hair clung to the sides of my face, shoulders, and back. Squeezing some of the shower gel into my hand, I looked for the first signs of those cracks again, but there weren’t any. I guessed the blood from the wolves I had killed would still be working for me, but for how long, I didn’t know. I hoped long enough for me to reach the Dead Waters.

With my fingertips, I worked the shampoo into my hair, and it smelt fresh and wonderful – a million miles away from the musty smell of the room where Jack had held me prisoner. I washed the dried werewolf blood from my arms, hands, and from in between my fingers. I just wanted to be rid of it. I turned off the water and stepped from the shower cubicle, grabbing a towel from a rail fixed to the wall. Wrapping it around me, I wiped the steam from the mirror and stared at my reflection. I looked into the eyes that stared back at me, and I somehow felt as if I were looking into the soul of a stranger. Those fine streaks of hazel around the edges of my pupils flashed orange like the rays of a hot sun. I opened my mouth and let my fangs protrude from my gums. Then, slowly I raised my hands and released my long, black claws. Rolling back my shoulders, I let the towel drop to the floor. Standing naked before the mirror, my wings sprang from my back like two giant sails unfurling. There was little room for them in the small bathroom, and they pressed flat against the shower cubicle behind me. The claws at each tip opened and closed slowly, as if grabbing hold of air. I looked at myself, knowing that this was only the second occasion I had ever taken the time to truly study myself – get to know what I truly was. My skin was paper white in utter contrast to my long, black wings and claws. In my half-breed form, my hair was more navy blue than black.

Even before I’d truly had a chance to come to terms with the realisation that I was only half human, I had suddenly learnt I wasn’t half human at all. I was a half and half – half Vampyrus and half wolf. What did that make me?

A freak – that’s what it made me. I was an abomination! I was born of a forbidden act. I was the result of a forbidden love affair between something close to a bat and a wolf. The Elders were right – such a creature like me shouldn’t be alive. Nature knew it, too – that’s why others like me – including Murphy’s daughters – had withered away, left to cling to life in some makeshift hospital hidden in the attic at Hallowed Manor.

Somehow the Dead Waters had saved me.

They had brought me back to life. But why? What was the purpose? Was it so I could be tormented?

Made to suffer? Or was there another reason?

The Elders had said I’d been chosen to choose between the humans and the Vampyrus – only one race could survive. But there was a third race – the Lycanthrope. Even if I had chosen between the humans and the Vampyrus, there would have still been two races left – the second being the Lycanthrope. What about them? Did the Elders have any idea what I truly was? Or had Murphy covered his tracks so well, that they still believed me to be a half-breed? I doubted they knew my true heritage. If they did, I’d be dead already, and so would Murphy. I looked at myself once more, then making a fist with my hand, I smashed it into the mirror. The glass fractured, distorting my face into a million different pieces. Blood trickled from between my knuckles and I licked them clean.