They could hear the echoes of their footsteps bouncing off every wall as they crept down the slimy passageway. The light of the lantern barely reached the walls on either side, and with every step the darkness seemed to press in closer. Still, it had been worse in Byzantium, hadn’t it? Gerard shook away the worries, and marched forward, determined to get to the bottom of this.

It was a full hour before he realised – before he noticed how quiet it had become. He spun.

“Lahav?”

Nothing. The corridor was completely empty. Now it was just him and the dark. Perfect.

A huge crashing sound bellowed out of a side passage, the clanging of metal on stone ringing in his ears. He set off immediately. Had Lahav simply got lost and fallen in the darkness? Before he’d taken even three steps another huge crash rang out.

“Lahav?!” he cried out.

He was sprinting now, the walls a blur of green and grey as he ran. He could feel his heart pumping, hear his feet pounding, as the last echoes of the mysterious sound began to fade into the darkness. This was when the candle died.

Gerard froze. Everything at once became silent – the sweat on his neck turned to ice. Quickly, he reached for the matches in his pocket, his cold fingers fumbling as he scrambled to relight the lantern. Finally, on the third strike, the match lit, and Gerard looked up, straight into the piercing eyes of his wife.

“AAAAH!!” He stumbled backward, collapsing to the floor with a smash. Before the echoes even started, she was screaming.

“What the HELL do you think you’re doing?! Letting Lahav wander off like that without even noticing? What if he’d died?! What if YOU’D died?! How could I have lived with myself if I’d have lost-

She became suddenly quiet.

“You should never have come here – should never have left me. Why, Gerard? Why would you abandon me to go off gallivanting with your knights? Do you really hate me so much?”

She turns her face away as Gerard stares at her, mouth wide open, unable to say a word. His chest feels as though it’s been ripped open – his heart torn out. He tries to speak but barely manages to splutter past the lump in his throat.

“How could I have been so foolish?” she whispers, still facing away from him. “You’re not the man I thought you were. You never loved me.” She trails off as she stifles a sob

“My, my…” Gerard stammers, as he begins to come to his senses. “My dear, how can you say such things? Of course I love you. I always have - I always will. Please, why would ever think that?”

Patience lets out a single sob.

Gerard begins to pull himself to his feet. “Oh my dear, please don’t… please don’t cry. Please, come here. I… I love you.” He stammers, raising his hands towards her.

As she turns to face him, she wipes a single tear from her eye. Her pale skin glows in the flickering light. Never had he looked upon a more beautiful face than hers, and never would he need to.

“Hold me, Gerard.” she whimpered, her legs nearly buckling under the weight of it all.

He takes one final step towards her, and it is then that her jaw drops. There is a split second of silence, then a blood curdling scream rips deep into every fibre of his being. Gerard throws his hands over his ears, as he watches his wife’s beautiful face contort in pure agony. Her skin splinters and cracks, as if the flesh were being ripped away from the bone. Her right cheek peels away, ripping and tearing all the way back until her entire right ear is hanging off.

Gerard stares in horror as the bloodied mess of muscle and bone that remains begins to melt away. Her eyes, once so beautiful, dissolve in their sockets, slowly dripping like tears. Her body crumples to the floor, and from the shadows emerges Lahav, carefully cleaning the blood from his blade.

“What the FUUUUUU!!!!”

Gerard launches himself at Lahav. The pair collapse to the ground, but Lahav doesn’t have much trouble throwing Gerard off.

“That was NOT your wife! Look!” he shouts, pointing at the corpse. What little is left looks like nothing Gerard has ever seen.

“It was a bloody mimic!”

Silence.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

More silence.

“Next job, then?” Lahav asks.

“No, no I… I think that’s more than enough for one day.”

“Suit yourself. I’ll see you back at HQ.” And with that, he disappears back off into the darkness.

Gerard leans against the wall of the passage and slowly slides down to the floor. As his head collapses into his hands, the echoes of his sobs ring through the sewers of London.