A smile twisted its way through Reuben’s scars. ‘Word is, the new kids on the block got themselves an enforcer who’s a card-carrying psycho. Gets off on maximum pain.’

‘You’re saying he was done by his own enforcer? What kind of—’

‘Think it’d be the first time one partner got greedy and the other one didn’t like it? ’

Fair point. But there was no way Agnes Garfield didn’t kill Anthony Chung. Not with the magic circle on the floor, and the pricking knife she used on him, and the one she stabbed Dildo with. . .

It had to be her.

Didn’t it?

Rowan huddles in the undergrowth on the wrong side of a chainlink fence. Don’t breathe. Don’t move.

The Raptor is gone, pootling away in his little Peugeot, his happy grandchildren in the back eating prawn cocktail crisps.

Why? Why would a Raptor punish witches like that? And not even ask any questions, just beat and pound away to an old song from the sixties. He hammered the Witch’s knees until they looked like bone-flecked mince, then had a sausage in a bun and a cup of tea, laughing with Betty and chatting about going to the Algarve for the school holidays.

And all the while, the Witch lies twitching on the ground behind the Burger and Baps van, bleeding into the dirt.

He barely moves when the ambulance arrives. Not even when the paramedics stand over him in their green jumpsuits, staring and swearing at the mess where his knees should be.

Betty stands to one side, sipping on a mug of something, lying to a police officer. No, she didn’t see anything. No, the man didn’t order anything from her. The first time she knew anything was wrong was when she went to check the gas bottles, and found him lying there. She’s round and small, too small for that deep rumbling voice, malevolent pulses of green and black oozing out of her like sound waves.

Rowan chews the skin around her left pinkie until the salty-copper tang of blood sparks at the end of her tongue.

It was her job to find and save the Witch, and instead he’s forever out of her reach. His soul is forfeit.

She’s failed.

The Transit van growled away, trailing a cloud of diesel exhaust behind it. Logan hauled Dan Fisher off the pavement and into one of the low-tech porters’ chairs reserved for hospital use. Just an oversized dining-room chair with four slightly wonky wheels bolted onto the legs.

Fisher moaned behind the gag, beneath the stained pillowcase.

Logan removed them both.

Underneath, Fisher’s face was pale and greasy. Shock.

A gentle slap on the cheek made him blink, his voice wet and creaky. ‘Please, I don’t know. . .’

‘You’re at A&E. Dan? Dan, can you hear me? ’