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the right moment to ask herself where she was.
                  Her heart started thumping harder making her breathing accelerate. She strained her eyes to see through the thick fog. Stumbling back and nearly falling over her own feet, she gasped as a figure darted towards her.
                  The fog vanished, she tried not think about how weird that was but failed. As the figure approached her she told her body not to shut down, not to be a coward. The thing was draped in robes similar to the ones Tabitha wore. Cora looked down and squealed in shock. The figure didn't touch the ground.
                  She started to step back, to force some distance between the thing and her. She blinked and the figure was gone. She looked around waiting for something else. Before she could make sense of everything her world once again turned black. A whisper of a voice reached her.
    It’s i n your blood…
    Ask Tabitha.
                  She jolted back hitting her head on something hard sending pain soaring across her temple. Groaning, she assessed her injuries. Her hand felt like a dead weight at the end of her arm. Her legs were heavy and cold and her entire body was battling against pins and needles as she lay on the cold kitchen floor.
                  Opening her eyes , she found that she was sat in darkness. Inch by inch she turned her head to the side and gasped as an explosion gripped her head like a vice. Closing her eyes, she held her breath waiting for the worst of it to abate. Like holding her breath was going to get rid of the pain? Pain was pain, holding your breath didn't get rid of it. She still did it anyway.
                  Once the pain had subsided, she attempted to move again and shifted her body to put all her weight on her knees. She grabbed the worktop and hoisted herself up to a standing position. Leaning over the sink, she sucked in deep breaths trying to ward off the fresh bout of sickness that was sloshing around high in her chest. The odour from her last sick episode rose up from the sink sending her stomach into disgusted spasms. Her throat closed trying to stop the onslaught. She moved away from the sink and counted slowly to ten concentrating on the function of her lungs moving in and out. Once the new wave of sickness had abated, she opened her eyes and looked at the time, 7:30pm. She couldn't say how long she'd been out cold.
                  As elegant as a new born baby on roller blades, she moved to the living room and noted that everything remained untouched from this morning . She held her hands tight against her raw stomach as she made her way to the hall. The house groaned as torrential wind smashed against it. The silence confirmed that she was definitely home alone.
                  Shuffling to the living room she slumped down hard onto the sofa and instantly regretted it, her resulting hiss made her head protest. She slowly moved back and nestled into the pillows. Images of the day flashed through her mind, her heart thudded harder. The image of his body slumped on the ground, the horrible scream of his friend, Tabitha, the weird shop, the disappearance of her mother.
                  Exhaustion washed over her making her yawn. Her eyelids were forced down. Suffocated by the need to sleep, she sank under.
    *
    Movement shimmered, light and dark flickered across her face. The light caressing her with much needed warmth. She groaned coming to her senses and was instantly aware of a presence nearby.
    “Cora, darling, are you awake?”
    She opened her eyes, her mum’s concerned face filled her vision, her hazel eyes rimmed by a distinct redness and her soft nutmeg hair hung limp around her face. She held her breath as pain shot through her body. She focused on trying not to scream, she didn't want to frighten her mother. As Cora focused on moving her damaged body little by little, her mother had