Ash Mistry and the City of Death

For my parents

When the stars threw down their spears,

And watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

“The Tyger” by William Blake

Contents

Dedication

Epigraph

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-one

Chapter Forty-two

Chapter Forty-three

Chapter Forty-four

Chapter Forty-five

Chapter Forty-six

Chapter Forty-seven

Chapter Forty-eight

Chapter Forty-nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-one

Chapter Fifty-two

Chapter Fifty-three

Chapter Fifty-four

Chapter Fifty-five

Chapter Fifty-six

Chapter Fifty-seven

Chapter Fifty-eight

Chapter Fifty-nine

Chapter Sixty

Also in the ASH MISTRY series

Copyright

About the Publisher

“

“C’mon, Ash,” said Akbar. “It’s now or never.”

Josh murmured in agreement.

“Fine. I’ll do it.” That’s if he didn’t die of heart failure first. “How do I look?”

Akbar grimaced. “Honestly? A bit sick.”

“Yeah,” added Josh. “Sweaty.”

“That’s so helpful,” Ash snapped back. His friends should be backing him up, not digging his grave. He swallowed and waited for his legs to stop shaking. “I’m going to do it. Now.”

Akbar swept his long, straggly black hair away from his face and peered past Ash. “Whenever you’re ready,” he said.

Josh did his tongue-wagging grin. Along with Sean, who was somewhere in the science block earning extra credit, the four of them were the Nerd Herd. The smartest, hardest-working, most socially inept and physically clumsy students to grace the hallowed halls of West Dulwich High.

Josh slapped Ash’s shoulder. “Just go.”

“Right. Now,” said Ash. “I’m off.”

He looked across the vast space of the crowded school canteen.

What’s the longest distance in the world?

That between you and your heart’s desire.

Gemma sat with her friends. She was laughing at something Anne was saying, and Ash watched as she brushed her golden hair from her face. Was it his imagination, or was it especially shiny today?

“Stop that, Ash,” said Josh. “You’re sighing again.”

“I’m not actually asking her out. You know that, don’t you?” Ash took another sip of water. How could his throat be so dry? “I’m just asking if she’s got plans for tonight.”

“Nope. Not asking her out at all,” said Josh.

“Though I hear she and Jack are no longer together. Jamie’s best friend, Debbie, heard it from her sister’s boyfriend,” added Akbar.

“Then it must be true. The golden couple have split.” Josh leaned closer, eyes darting across the canteen. “So, if you were asking her out, which you are not, now would be the time. Or wouldn’t, if you weren’t.”

“Whatever.” Ash stood up. The chair’s metal legs screeched as they scraped across the floor. It was strange how something as automatic as, like, walking, could suddenly become so difficult. Left, right, don’t trip over anything or crash into a table. Why were there so many tables in here? And chairs? And people? He’d never make it over there!

Oh God, she’s seen me.

Be cool. Remember who you are.

Ash Mistry. Eternal Warrior. The demons of hell wet their pants when they hear your name.

Gemma was still talking to Anne, but her head was half turned and her eyes were on him. She gave a little laugh. Why was she laughing? Was it something Anne had said, or because of him? Even from here Ash saw the light sparkle in her hazel eyes. She had amazing eyes, sometimes grey, sometimes green, sometimes brown. Amazing eyes.

But why is she looking at me like that?

Oh no, have I got snot hanging from my nostril? Is my fly open?

He should have checked. Surely one of his mates would have told him?

No, the scumbags. He bet they were laughing their heads off, watching him stroll over with a bogey dangling down his face. Or worse: with his Doctor Who boxers on full exposure. Maybe he could detour to the corridor and do a full body check.

“Hi, Ash,” said Gemma.

“Er, hi, Gemma.”

The table fell totally silent. All ten of Gemma’s friends stopped eating, chatting and texting, and turned their attention to him.

Why oh why hadn’t he waited ’til after school? Caught her on the way home or something? Or in maths? She sat next to him in maths. Maths would have been perfect.

“You OK?” she asked. “You’re looking a bit pale.”

Ash stared at her mouth. Her teeth were a row of perfect little pearls and her lips red and glossy. Two dimples appeared as her smile grew. He smelled the soft, flowery scent of her perfume, making him think of springtime and bright sunlight. Jeez, she smelled of springtime and sunlight? He needed to slap himself hard before he felt the overwhelming desire to write poetry. Again.

“I’m fine. Totally fine,” he said. “How are you? Fine?”

Did I just say that? Beyond lame.

Gemma arched her eyebrows, waiting. “Was there something you wanted?”

Ask her out. Just ask her out.

“I was wondering,” he began, pausing to lick his oh-so-dry lips. “Wondering about Bonfire Night. Y’know, it’s Bonfire Night. Tonight.”

Aaargh. So totally smooth.

“Yes?” She shifted around on her chair, her blonde curls bouncing as she looked up at him.

Oh my God. Was that a hair flick? It was some sort of code. Hair flicks meant something; he’d read about it in one of his sister’s magazines. But what? He was deep in unknown territory: the world of girls.

“If you’re going?” he said. “To the big bonfire in Dulwich Park. Tonight.”

Like she couldn’t work that out herself. That was so special needs.

“Why? Are you going?”

She’s asking me? What does that mean?

“I was thinking—”

“Clear the way, loser.”

Jack Owen dropped his bag on the floor and himself on an empty chair. He leaned the chair back on its two legs and flipped his mobile – the latest iPhone – from his Prada leather jacket. He glanced over his shoulder as he texted. “You still here?”

Jack Owen. Ash’s arch-enemy. The arch-enemy of the entire Nerd Herd. Tanned, ridiculously handsome in that obvious ‘big muscles, perfect features, straight nose and floppy hair’ sort of way. Oh yeah, and captain of the football, rugby and cricket teams too. A company-director dad and all the toys money could buy.

I am Ash Mistry. I’ve done things that would melt Jack’s brain. I’ve fought Ravana, the greatest evil the world has ever known. I’ve defeated the demon nations.

Then why do I want to puke?

Ash moved half a step back. That was the old Ash, who would back down and hide. Then the new Ash rose like a black snake up through his belly, driving a sharp, flint-hard anger into his throat. “I was talking to Gemma.”

“And now you’re not.” Slowly, Jack got to his feet and faced Ash.

Gemma put her hand on Jack’s wrist. “C’mon, Jack, this is stupid.”

Jack looked Ash up and down.

“I see you’ve lost some weight. Turned some of that lard into muscle.” Jack leaned so close that he was whispering in Ash’s ear. “Think you can take me? Is that it? You a tough guy now?”

Jack had no idea.

So many ways to kill you.

Two bright golden lights settled on Jack’s neck – one just below his bulging Adam’s apple, the other near the jaw.

Easy ways.

Ash closed his eyes. But he could see the bright points shining through his eyelids. He covered his face with his hands, but it did no good.

Jack laughed. “Look at him. He’s going to cry.” He prodded Ash in the chest. “Boo hoo.”

“Leave him alone, Jack. It’s not nice.”

“Jesus, Gemma, I’m just trying to toughen the boy up.” There was a laugh from one of the others round the table. “Everyone knows he’s madly in luurve with you. Isn’t that true, Ash?”

“Jack, I’m warning you.”

Jack ignored her. “C’mon, Ash. We all know you fancy her. Be a man, just say it.” He put his fingers on either side of Ash’s chin, wiggling it up and down. “Say it. ‘Gemma, I love you so much.’” He squeezed harder, burying his nails into Ash’s skin. “Say it.”

Ash opened his eyes and gazed at the brilliant lights that lay like a galaxy of stars over Jack. They glistened along his arteries. They shone upon his heart, his lungs. Joints sparkled. His eyes were golden bright.

The Chinese called it Dim Mak, the Death Touch. But to Ash it was Marma Adi, the 108 kill points. He knew them all – the points of weakness all living things possessed – and he could exploit these points to injure, disable, or kill. They moved and varied in intensity depending on the person. The old, infirm and very young had many more than the 108. Jack had fewer – he was young and strong and fit – but he had enough.

There was a spot glowing on the side of Jack’s head. Ash just needed to touch it, not very hard. Enough to create a blood clot in the brain. Death would come in five seconds, maybe six.

It would look like an accident.

“I’d let go, Jack,” said Ash. A warning. That was fair.

“Or what?”

Ash shivered. It wasn’t fear that made his heart quicken; it was excitement. He slowly raised his right hand. He could just tap the spot with his finger…

“That’s it.” Gemma got up and grabbed her bag. “C’mon, Anne.”

“Whatever,” said Jack, letting go of Ash. He grinned at the audience and got a smattering of embarrassed giggles for his performance.

Gemma gave Jack a withering look as she slung her rucksack over her shoulder and strode off, almost knocking down some small kid. Jack turned to Ash and winked.

“Way out of your league.” He picked up his own bag, making sure he tensed his biceps as he did so. “Leave the hot ones to guys like me. You stick to the farmyard animals.” Then he left. The others round the table, the entertainment over, quickly gathered their own gear and began to break up. Anne gave Ash a half-shrug before scurrying off after Gemma.

Ash stood by the now-empty table. What was he thinking? He stared at his hand like it wasn’t his. He’d almost killed Jack. Over what?

Josh joined Ash. “Well, that went down like the Titanic.”

Ash looked at him. Lungs, heart… There were nodes of energy shining on Josh’s throat, and on either side of his eyes too. So many… Ash retreated a step, afraid an accidental touch might kill his best friend.

“You all right?” Josh asked.

Ash braced himself against a table. “Just… catching my breath.” The sensation passed. It felt like a cloud fading from his soul. The Marma Adi visions were happening more and more often. He needed to be careful.

“That was banging,” said Josh.

“Banging?”

“Where were you over the summer, Ash? Oh yeah, out in India, bored out of your brain. Everyone’s using it. ‘Banging.’ Impressive. Of an epic nature.”

“What? Really? That was impressive?” Ash blinked, more than a little surprised by the assessment. “I thought I looked like a moron.”

“You did,” said Josh. “I was talking about Jack. That was a great line, don’t you think? The one about the farmyard animals. Couldn’t have thought it up himself, but he’s got the delivery.”

“I just wish I’d had something smart and devastating to say back,” said Ash.

Josh nodded. “Like ‘In your fat face, Jack’? That’s pretty cool.”

“If you’re seven.” Ash gazed towards the canteen doors, half hoping Gemma might turn round and come back. No such luck. “Why is it so hard to talk to girls?”

Josh slapped Ash’s head. “Because we’re nerds. Acting awkwardly around girls is our superpower. Anyway, forget about Gemma. You coming around next Tuesday?”

“Tuesday?” asked Ash.

“Dungeons and Dragons, old-school style. We’re on the last level of the ‘The Catacombs of Doom’ and we need you, Ash.”

Oh yeah, Dungeons and Dragons. Josh’s dad had banned him from any sort of computer gaming – any sort of computer access at all. Josh hadn’t explained why, but Akbar reckoned he’d been caught visiting a few sites way inappropriate for his age. So they’d dusted off their old role-playing games and miniature figures, and Tuesday nights were D&D.

Josh put his arm over Ash’s shoulder. “It will bang to the utmost. You’ll be fighting the demon lord of hell.”

“Done that already.”

“What?”

“Never mind.” Ash wriggled out from under Josh’s heavy arm. “Remind me again why I hang out with you?”

Josh gave a mocking sob. “What? After all I’ve done for you? If it hadn’t been for me, remember, Gemma wouldn’t know you even exist. That poem you wrote her was banging.”

“Uploading it on to the school blog wasn’t what I had in mind.”

“Then you should have a better password than ‘TARDIS’, shouldn’t you?”

He could do that, but he couldn’t ask a girl out. Anger surged within him, and Ash struggled to cool down.

But maybe he didn’t want to cool down. Maybe he could show Jack and everyone what he was capable of. They’d look at him differently then.

Yeah, they’d look at him with horror.

Some days, it was as if nothing had ever happened, and Ash was just a normal fourteen-year-old boy trying to keep on the straight and narrow. Not exceptionally bright like Akbar, nor as cool as Jack, just kind of in the middle, not making any ripples.

But then the dreams came. Dreams of blood and death.

Then Ash remembered exactly what he was.

The Kali-aastra, the living weapon of the death goddess Kali. He’d slain the demon king Ravana and absorbed his preternatural energies. He could leap tall buildings in a single bound and do five impossible things before breakfast. Six at the weekend.

Had it only been last summer? It felt like a lifetime ago. It had been a lifetime ago. Ash touched the scar on his abdomen that he’d got when his old life had, literally, ended. Three months had passed since his rebirth, and the powers had lessened somewhat, but that was like saying K2 was smaller than Mount Everest. It was still a huge mountain and Ash was still somewhere high above normal.

He remembered going running one night in September, just after coming back from India. Ravana’s strength surged through every atom of his body, and it was threatening to explode out of him, so he’d needed to burn it off. He ran. And ran and ran. He’d stopped when he got to Edinburgh. He’d climbed the old castle, then run all the way back. He’d still been home before dawn.

But raw power wasn’t everything. There was no point in having the strength to knock out an elephant if you didn’t have the skill to hit it where it hurt most. So every morning before the sun came up, Ash crept out to the park or the nearby Sydenham Woods and trained. He’d been taught the basics of Kalari-payit, the ancient Indian martial art, and once he’d caught a glimpse of Kali herself and watched her fight. Somewhere in his DNA lay all the arts of combat. Kicks, high and low, sweeping arcs, punches, spear-strikes, blocks and grapples. He shifted from one move to another with instinctive grace. That rhythm, the dance of Kali, came to him more and more easily.

Would he ever be truly ‘normal’? No. The death energies he’d absorbed from Ravana would fade away over time, but when? It could be decades. Centuries. There were no scales that could measure the strength of the demon king. And when – if – Ravana’s energies did fade, Ash would for ever absorb more. Death was the one certainty, and death strengthened him.

Death was everywhere.

Now, in winter, the trees lining the road had lost their summer coats, and the gutters were filled with damp, golden leaves steadily rotting, steadily dying. A small trickle of power entered his fingertips as he passed along the decaying piles. At night Ash gazed at stars and wondered whether somewhere out in the universe there was a supernova happening, a star’s life ending. A solar system becoming extinct, waves of energy radiating out across the cosmos. Were the heavens making him stronger too?

It felt too big sometimes, what he was and what it meant. So he liked to be normal at school. That was why he hid his powers. It was nice to pretend, to escape, even if it was just for a few hours a day.

He registered that it was cold, but it didn’t bother him. He wore the sweater merely for show nowadays. It had just turned half past four, and the long, late autumn shadows led him home.

Ash stopped by his garden gate and looked up and down the road. For what? Gemma following him home? Not bloody likely, given his pathetic performance in the lunch hall.

You blew it.

So much about him had changed and not changed. He still didn’t understand maths and he certainly couldn’t get a date.

He turned into Croxted Road and saw a battered white van parked outside their drive. Must be to do with Number 43; they were having their house repainted. He’d ask them to move it before Dad got home. If they didn’t, he could do it himself. It looked about three tons. No problem.

Lucky opened the door before Ash even knocked. His sister was still in her school uniform, green sweater and grey skirt, grey socks that came up to her knees. Her long black ponytail flicked across her face as she turned back and forth. “Ash—”

“Before you ask, the answer is no.” Ash went in and threw his rucksack into the corner. “I did not ask Gemma out.”

“Ash—”

“Just give it a rest, will you? Who says I’m interested in her anyway?” He passed through the hall to the kitchen. He really needed some comfort food right now, and that packet of doughnuts up on the sweets shelf would do nicely. Lucky grabbed his sleeve as he turned the door handle.

“Ash!”

“What?”

Lucky was the only one who knew what he’d been through in India, but she didn’t treat him any differently, which was why, even though she was eleven and way too smart for her own good, he would die for her.

Had died for her.

You would think that would count for something, wouldn’t you? But right now she was being a typical younger sister. Which was irritating.

Lucky stared hard at him, as if she was trying to project her thoughts directly into his head. Alas, while he could kill with a touch, Ash couldn’t read minds. Maybe that would come later.

“What is it?” he said. Then he paused and sniffed the air. “Is Dad smoking again? Mum will go mental if he’s doing it in the house.”

“This is nothing to do with Dad.” Lucky frowned and crossed her arms. Not good. “You’ve got visitors.” Then she spun on her heels and stomped upstairs to her room. The whole house shook as she slammed the door.

Gemma? Had she come over to see him? She did live just down the road. It had to be. He checked that his fly was up and quickly wiped his nose. Then he opened the kitchen door.

So not Gemma. A gaunt old woman leaned against the sink, blowing cigarette smoke out of the half-open window. Her hair would have suited a witch: wild, thick as a bush and grey as slate. She dropped her stub into Ash’s Yoda mug, where it died with a hiss.

The old woman smiled at Ash, her thin lips parting to reveal a row of yellow teeth. It wasn’t pretty. She searched her baggy woollen cardigan and took out a packet of Marlboro Lights. She flicked her Zippo and within two puffs the fresh cigarette was glowing.

“You’re not allowed to smoke in here,” Ash said. He’d been brought up to respect his elders – it was the Indian way – but there was something thoroughly disrespectful about this woman.

“So you’re Ash Mistry,” she said. “The Kali-aastra.”

Ash tensed. “Do I know you?”

“I’m Elaine.”

“I don’t know any Elaines.”

“She’s a friend of mine.”

Ash spun round at the new voice, one he recognised.

An Indian girl stepped out from behind the fridge. That was why he hadn’t seen her, but then she was very good at being invisible. She played with a silver locket as she gazed at him through her big black sunglasses. She wore a pair of dark green trousers and a black cotton shirt, its collar and cuffs embroidered with entwined serpents. Looking at her, a stranger would guess she was about fifteen. They’d only be off by about four thousand years.

She took off her glasses, and her pupils, vertical slits, dilated with sly amusement. The green irises filled out the rest of her eyes, leaving no whites at all. Her lips parted into a smile, and Ash glimpsed a pair of half-extended venomous fangs where her canines should have been.

She looked like a vampire, cold and with a terrible beauty. But no vampire could compare to her. She was the daughter of the demon king and born to end men’s lives.

“Namaste,” said Parvati.