The Devil's Paintbox. Robin Jarvis

with Whitby and its witch. When she is defeated, and I compel her to watch the destruction of everything she is pledged to protect, I shall offer up her overwhelming despair unto Them as sacrifice. Whitby’s doom is assured.’

      ‘It had better be,’ the emissary hissed.

      The girl on the bicycle squeezed the brake and slid off the saddle when it halted sharply. Tracy Evans hadn’t ridden one of these since she was ten years old and she hadn’t enjoyed it then. She cursed under her breath. It would have been easier – and a lot less exhausting – to have stolen a car.

      So here she was, twenty miles out of Whitby, at half past one in the morning, breathless with the exertion and pale from the anaemia that had afflicted her since the spring.

      Shivering and sweating on this warm summer night, Tracy wiped her dripping face and looked at the stretch of road ahead. She was on a remote tract of countryside at the edge of the moors. There were no street lamps and the moon was behind clouds, but the lonely road was not featureless. Her destination was close and lit by stark bulbs.

      MCKENZIE METALS a large sign declared near the wide, gated entrance. FERROUS AND NON-FERROUS SCRAP & END-OF-LIFE VEHICLES SPECIALISTS.

      It was a sprawling plot of urban refuse surrounded by fields and hedgerows. The large scrapyard was fenced by high corrugated iron sheets topped with barbed wire, snarled with dirty tatters of old plastic bags that fluttered in the light breeze. Tracy and her cronies had always called rustling rags like that ‘witches’ knickers’ and the memory brought a sad smile to her face. She hadn’t spoken to Bev and Angie for months. She had been told she didn’t need them any more: only one person mattered in her life now.

      Tracy grunted at the momentary stab of regret. It was a mark of weakness and she despised that. Clenching her jaw, she concentrated on the matter in hand.

      Beyond that forbidding perimeter she could see irregular hills of rusting cars, battered cookers and dirty washing machines. The skeletal arm of a crane towered above everything and its shadow cut deep across the road.

      She took a phone from her pocket and stroked the screen that was sticky with drying blood.

      ‘Dark?’ she spoke urgently. ‘Dark, are you there?’

      The screen glimmered pale green and a pair of eyes appeared, as hypnotic and powerful as the first time she had beheld them and fallen under their spell.

      ‘I am never far from your side, my sweetest heart,’ a reassuring voice answered.

      Tracy pressed the phone to her lips and kissed it.

      She believed the voice belonged to the ghost of the most gorgeous lad she’d ever seen. For several months he had been the ultimate secret boyfriend, communicating via her phone when she smeared the screen with her own blood. He had told her he was the agent of mysterious ancient beings and they were going to grant him new life once he had completed a task for them. But the weeks had dragged by and her heart’s one dream was still only a phantom.

      ‘Tonight we’ll finally be together, yeah?’ she asked uncertainly. ‘Proper like you promised, not just on my phone or a shadow. It’s been so long. Sometimes I don’t believe it’ll ever happen. I can’t stand it!’

      ‘It is no simple matter to cross the bridge from death to life. Special measures must be in place, and this time there must be no resistance, no interference from the witch of Whitby.’

      ‘That Cherry Cerise is a mad old bag, everyone knows it.’

      ‘And yet she managed to hinder our previous endeavour – she and her acolyte.’

      ‘Lil pigging Wilson!’ Tracy spat. ‘She’s nothing. I’d love to smack the smug smiles off both their faces.’

      The voice chuckled softly.

      ‘Together we shall do so much more than that.’

      ‘Makes me heave, seeing them lord it, thinking they’re better than everyone else. Hope they suffer, real bad.’

      ‘Oh, they shall, do not doubt it. They dared to obstruct the will of forces far beyond them and such insolence is never forgiven.’

      ‘I’m so gonna snog your handsome face off, the first second you’re here for real!’

      ‘Not before I kiss the life right out of you, dearest girl. Now make haste. Go to the entrance.’

      ‘It’ll be locked.’

      ‘Do as I say. You have brought the coins?’

      Tracy shook the other pocket of her jacket. It was heavy with change.

      ‘Every ten pence I could find,’ she said. ‘Went through my mum’s purse, our Liam’s money box and I pinched the charity tin from the post office, about seven quid’s worth. What’s it all for?’

      There was no answer. Leaning the bicycle against a hedge, Tracy approached the wide double gate. Another sign warned of guard dogs. Tracy eyed it and chewed her lip. Close by there was a metal door set into one half of the entrance and she gave it a testing push.

      ‘Told you it was locked.’

      ‘Hold up the device,’ the voice ordered.

      Tracy raised her phone. The green light shone brighter and she heard bolts being dragged across on the other side of the metal. With a rusty squeal the door swung inward. Immediately, ferocious barking broke out. Two large Rottweilers with chests like barrels came tearing across the yard from a dilapidated lean-to.

      Tracy lunged for the door to snatch it back again, but the voice forbade her.

      ‘Do not fear the beasts. I shall shield you from their bite. Trust me and enter.’

      The girl stepped inside. The savage dogs rushed towards her, their great jaws snapping. Instinctively Tracy froze and squeezed her eyes shut. A stream of black smoke poured out from her phone and took shape behind her. The barking grew fiercer and closer – and then, abruptly, it ceased. She heard large paws skidding on gravel, followed by a frantic, tumbling scramble.

      Tracy opened her eyes to see the dogs cowering, staring fearfully at something over her shoulder. Their ears were flat and they were whimpering. Then, timid as lambs, they bowed and rolled on to their backs, exposing their throats. Cold laughter mocked them.

      ‘Rise and dance the jig of Dark for me.’

      The Rottweilers flipped over. With a grunting effort they reared their hulking bodies on to their hind legs, and pranced around each other like circus poodles.

      Tracy felt the hairs on her neck bristle and a chill breath blew across her shoulders.

      ‘You’re here!’ she cried excitedly. ‘Dark! You’re here!’

      ‘Do not turn around,’ the voice warned, close to her ear.

      ‘Why? Why can’t I see you?’

      ‘No questions. We have not yet claimed what we came for.’

      A slice of yellow light cut a diagonal across the yard as a door in a Portakabin opened. A grizzled nightwatchman in a vest and wielding a baseball bat descended the steps.

      ‘Kong! Tank! What were that racket for? What’s up with the pair of you?’

      He cast a cautious glance about the towering stacks of twisted metal. The cigarette he was smoking dropped from his lips when he saw his fearsome dogs capering in a circle, performing before a sickly-looking teenage girl.

      ‘Hoy!’ he yelled, striding forward. ‘Who the ’ell are you and what you done to my dogs? Tank! Kong! Down! Get here!’

      The man’s