В мрачном английском замке на севере страны жестокий убийца оставляет позади следы своего злого шарта. Призрак-убийца извлекает душу жертвы в собственное тело, чтобы продолжить кровавые игры. В мире, где мертвых поднимается с могилы, чудовищный убийца приходит за новым жертвоприношением....
She’s ill. Killing is one of the symptoms of her illness.’
Susan put the glass to her lips and emptied it. She made a sour face. ‘I’m not good at this,’ she said. I was surprised I hadn’t noticed the slur in her voice at the door. ‘I don’t even like the taste. I think I’m going to get sick before I get drunk.’
‘Susan-’ I began. She shook her head impatiently.
‘Play your tune. I want this to be over. I don’t want it in my life any more.’
I nodded. For the third time that night I unshipped my whistle and held it in my hands, ready to play.
I played a note, more or less at random, hoping my sixth sense would kick in and the music would start to flow.
I lowered the whistle and stared at it, blinking my eyes back into focus. It was strange, and it was frightening. I’d had good days and bad days, but I’d never had my knack desert me quite so suddenly and completely before. All I wanted to do was the summoning. It was the easiest part of an exorcism: it just made a path, a line of least resistance for the spirit you were looking for to move through.
‘She’s already here,’ I said. ‘Isn’t she?’
‘She’s upstairs,’ Susan muttered, pointing. ‘In our bedroom. Or it was our bedroom. I don’t know what it is now.
I walked right on past her. I wanted to offer her some kind of solace but what could I have said? Bad friend Felix was on the prowl again: good news wasn’t on the agenda.
The main bedroom was dead ahead. Juliet was sitting on the windowsill, legs hugged to her chest, both feet off the ground. In a way it was a curiously little-girlish pose.
