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- Herausgeber: The O'Brien Press
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Serie: Dubh Linn
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014
Welcome to The Other Side ... Chasing a thief, Izzy Gregory takes a wrong turn down a Dublin alley and finds the ashes of a fallen angel splashed across the dirty bricks like graffiti. She stumbles into Dubh Linn, the shadowy world inhabited by the Sidhe, where angels and demons watch over the affairs of mortals, and Izzy becomes a pawn in their deadly game. Her only chance of survival lies in the hands of Jinx, the Sidhe warrior sent to capture her for his sadistic mistress, Holly. Izzy is something altogether new to him, turning his world upside down. A thrilling, thought-provoking journey to the magic that lies just beside reality.
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To Pat, Diarmuid and Emily.
So many people helped make this book happen, this crazy story that didn’t seem to fit in anywhere. I can never thank all of them, but if you have had a hand in this, thank you! More specifically, I have a few people to thank in particular.
Whoever painted the angel graffiti on South William Street, first of all, because that was the spark of this story; my wonderful and ever-supportive Shiny Shiny Critique group for all the … oooh, shiny!; my agent, Sallyanne Sweeney, for her faith in me; the lovely Celine Kiernan for an inspired suggestion; everyone at The O’Brien Press and my editor, Helen, for really getting the world and its inhabitants in a way few others did.
And most of all my ever-patient friends and family. Especially Pat, Diarmuid and Emily. Here’s to a lifetime of trips to the wishing stone and saying our (carefully respectful) hellos to Brí.
Contents
Chapter One
Stepping Sideways
Izzy had only just pushed down the lever on the toaster when it exploded with an audible pop. Sparks flared up like fireworks and pungent black smoke filled the kitchen.
Dad cursed loudly – words he seriously wasn’t meant to say in front of her – and jumped up from the kitchen table.
‘Stand back from the bloody thing,’ he said and ripped the plug from the wall. ‘Are you okay, Izzy?’
She nodded, trying not to inhale the acrid fumes. ‘Fine, Dad. I’m fine.’ He looked comical standing there with the cord swinging from his hand like a pendulum, glaring at the toaster as if he had a lifelong grudge against it.
It wasn’t like this was the first time. She knew the drill. She punched the switch on the extractor fan and opened the windows while Dad prodded the toaster suspiciously, waiting for it to attack again.
A deathly silence settled over the kitchen until Mum rustled the paper. ‘The technological curse is definitely hereditary then, is it?’
Izzy grinned, aware from her mother’s voice that she was stifling laughter. She couldn’t help herself. It was funny.
Dad gave an affronted huff. ‘Your daughter wasn’t hurt, since you’re so concerned.’
‘Oh, good. That’s a relief, as always. What item is going to suffer the wrath of the two of you next?’
She folded up the paper, poured herself the last cup of coffee and winked at Izzy, who leaned on the counter and suppressed a giggle. Dad picked up the toaster, crossed to the back door and tossed it onto the patio. It clattered onto the stones and he slammed the door after it.
‘There, all gone. And good riddance. Better use the grill, Izzy.’
‘You aren’t leaving that out there,’ Mum protested. ‘It’s a garden, not a dump!’
‘The toaster’s dead, love. Let it rest in peace. I’ll take it to the recycling centre later.’ He put the jug under the coffee machine and hit the red button. It gurgled away happily.
‘Careful!’ said Mum. Of all the machines in the house, Izzy thought, they couldn’t afford to lose that one. Neither of her parents would be able to function. She went to the fridge and got a yogurt instead. Far safer. She and Dad had an uncanny way with electrical items. Mainly with destroying them.
‘I won’t break it,’ Dad argued. ‘I’ve never broken the coffee machine! The coffee machine loves me.’
God, they were embarrassing.
‘Just stay away from my laptop, David,’ Mum warned him. ‘I’m not sure I could take another I’ve-never-seen-that-before helpline conversation.’ That made Dad grimace dramatically. Izzy rolled her eyes to heaven, because next thing she knew they were kissing in a way that ought to be strictly forbidden to anyone over twenty-one.
But at least they were happy together. Not coldly ignoring each other or getting divorced like the parents of half her classmates. They were happy, and she was happy for them.
Even if they were mortifying.
‘Better get dressed,’ Dad said. ‘Izzy, do you want a lift? I’m heading out by the Temple of Mammon.’
She winced. The enormous shopping centre in Dundrum didn’t call itself a ‘shopping centre’, but rather a ‘Town Centre’. And Dad didn’t even call it that. He had opinions about shopping centres. Opinions with capital letters, quotes, underlines and italics. Probably why he barely had enough business to get by these days. You’d think in a recession, an architect would be a bit more circumspect about whose buildings he was criticising. But that was Dad, through and through.
Problem was, she agreed with him. She was the only teenage girl she knew who hated the place.
‘No, thanks. I thought I’d head into town later on. Dylan’s band have a gig this afternoon.’
Town wasn’t something man-made, or designed. Town was the centre of Dublin, an unwritten but perfectly understood area that had created itself, grown organically, carelessly – a grubby, worn-at-the-seams paradise divided by a river. A place of narrow lanes left over from the Viking settlement and the stately Georgian avenues of the Wide Street Commissioners.
Izzy loved Dublin, loved just mooching about, down laneways or around the iron-railed squares, listening to buskers, looking at street art and window shopping. It was a place to just generally hang out, sometimes meeting friends, sometimes on her own. Summer was heaven for that.
She should have known the city centre like the back of her hand at this stage, and yet she always found something new in it. That was its magic, the maze that was Town, a hodge-podge of public and secret places from countless eras, squished together over the course of a thousand years, always new, always old.
‘Oh, where are they playing?’ asked Mum eagerly. Too eagerly.
Izzy was still living down the last time they turned up to one of Dylan’s gigs. Marianne loved bringing that one up. Izzy had known Dylan so long her parents seemed to think of him as their own kid rather than Izzy’s friend.
‘Just a promo thing. No biggie. Anyway, you’re at work. It’s in the afternoon.’ The words came out in a quick rush and she took the opportunity to escape before they could ask any more details like exactly when and where.
The DART rattled along the tracks, green and ugly. The train was a lifeline for anyone living on the outskirts of the city, a way to get out of the suburban seaside and swing around the sweep of the bay right into the heart of town. Izzy gazed out the window instead of listening to music or playing with her phone like her fellow passengers. The treacherous sand flats of Sandymount Strand, beloved of Joyce, stretched out beyond the wall, the sea rushing in on them with white horses in the waves, breaking off the submerged sandbars. The wind was getting up, but the sky was still clear and blue. Summer wasn’t always so beautiful. Usually it was notable for the extra rain, but not this year. This year it was golden and beautiful, like a childhood memory of summers past. It transformed the whole place.
Izzy pushed her way off the train at Pearse Station and joined the crowds streaming down the steep slope to street level. She wandered around the edge of Trinity College, dodging tourists clustered around their coaches and beggars holding paper coffee cups.
‘Spare change, bud?’ someone mumbled from the level of her knees and she saw a flash of yellow teeth in a grimy face. Gimlet eyes met hers, stopping her in her tracks. Breath caught in her throat, but she couldn’t move, not right away. It felt like someone was holding the back of her neck in an iron grip. ‘Spare change, love?’ he said again, his grin even wider now.
Someone pushed between them, breaking the contact, and Izzy could move again. She jerked away, crossing the road and trying not to look as if she was running. There was nothing to run from. Just an old guy looking for money. But her heart hammered against the inside of her ribs.
It didn’t calm until she’d reached Grafton Street, where she paused outside the bank among the shoppers and foreign language students watching a fairly crusty busker playing the guitar like a Spanish master. And here she was, getting freaked out. Stupid, really. She knew better than to let her imagination run away with her. Dad always told her that things were what they were. No one needed to imagine anything worse. Just an old beggar and her overactive imagination.
Izzy let herself breathe more calmly and the noise and conversation, the laughter and shouts, swept over her. The street was full of colour everywhere, and sound like a physical force. She lingered at the shop windows without going inside. It wasn’t a day for shopping, even if she had any money to spare. This was just a day for herself. The school holidays weren’t the same when you got older. She worked every hour she could get in the coffee shop down the road from her house, while most of her friends were content to waste the summer away. Well, maybe that wasn’t fair. Part-time jobs and summer work were tough to come by these days.
Still, Marianne, Dylan’s sister and Izzy’s classmate and co-worker, could be less of a prima donna about it all.
She was looking in the window of the camera shop, lusting after an SLR she couldn’t ever hope to afford, when in the reflection she caught a glimpse of the beggar again, on the far side of the road, sitting in a doorway surrounded by cardboard and a ratty-looking blanket. The same man. She was sure of it. Her spine stiffened in alarm. He didn’t move, still as one of those fake statue people further down the road, just staring at her with eyes that caught the light in a weirdly metallic way. He wasn’t painted gold or silver though. If he had a colour it would be ‘grime’.
He was the one she’d seen earlier on Nassau Street. He grinned the same way, held her gaze as if to hypnotise her and hold her there. Like a cobra with its prey.
The street cleaning truck rumbled by, breaking the spell. Izzy shuddered and turned with a start, able to move again in an instant. He was gone. As if he’d never been there. No sign of him at all. Just an empty doorway, a tangle of blanket and some ragged ends of cardboard. No one was there at all.
Izzy shook her head. She’d imagined it, seen some sort of trick of the light in the reflection. There was nothing there.
But at the top of the street, she thought she saw him again, lurking by the vast grey arch of the gates to St Stephen’s Green. Izzy turned away, wincing and wishing there was a cop around. The creep was shadowing her.
She jumped as her phone rang in her pocket. As she fished it out, her hands were shaking so hard she almost dropped it. She glanced over her shoulder. He was gone again and a loud group of tourists stood there instead, comparing brightly coloured maps.
‘Let me guess.’ Dylan’s voice sounded deep with amusement. ‘You’re sightseeing.’
Seeing something. Not sights. Not good ones.
She looked around, half expecting the beggar to be back, half dreading catching sight of him again.
Her voice shook. ‘How can I sightsee here? I’ve seen it.’
Dylan didn’t notice her tone. He laughed. ‘Yeah, sure. You can sightsee anywhere, Izzy. Especially here. I know you. Okay, you’re wandering around town looking at the buildings and pretending you’re window shopping?’
Busted.
Or at least that was what she had been doing, before she’d acquired a potential stalker.
‘You in town?’ she asked, deliberately not answering his question. That amused him even more. She could hear it in his voice.
‘Just got in. So are you coming?’
‘Now?’ She couldn’t check the time and talk at the same time. She tried to balance the phone against her shoulder and twist her wrist around to look at the watch. After two. Shit, how had that happened?
Mari’s voice sounded in the background, saying something about Izzy always being late – which was a lie if she was talking about work – and then she laughed. Izzy knew that laugh. It was the flirty, I’m-so-gorgeous-aren’t-you-just-sick laugh she reserved for those guys she fancied beyond reason. Like the bass player in Dylan’s band.
‘Soon,’ said Dylan. ‘You’ll come though, won’t you?’ He broke off before she could answer, said something she couldn’t quite make out to the others and then he was back. ‘I’ve got to go. Soundcheck’s starting. Look, this thing won’t even take the whole afternoon. We’re going to grab a bite to eat and maybe go clubbing later?’
Izzy frowned. Like she could afford that. She’d love to, though. It had been so long since she’d been out with Dylan. With the guys from the band they’d get in wherever. That was probably what Mari was counting on. Dylan was two years older than both his sister and Izzy, finished school and starting university. Hanging around with him – embarrassing nerd-muso brother or not – opened up a world of possibilities for Mari.
‘I’ve kind of got to go home,’ she muttered, wishing she could just blithely say ‘yes’ and not think about the consequences. ‘I’ve work in the morning and I promised Mum and Dad. But I’m on my way now. Be there soon.’
It wasn’t far to Exchequer Street. She could make it with plenty of time. All she had to do was cut down by the side of the shopping centre, past the theatre and head down South William Street. Ten minutes max.
She was only halfway there when the phone rang again.
She tried to juggle fishing her ringing phone out of her pocket and avoiding the crowds of afternoon shoppers who would probably just trample her to the ground and keep going if she stopped. Stumbling out of the way of three suits on lunch break and some tourists who were clearly lost and flapping brightly coloured maps around like sails, she hopped up onto the steps leading to a design shop.
‘Where are you?’ Marianne barked, before even a hello or anything.
‘I’m on the way.’
‘I’m standing here on my own. They’re all up there fiddling with the sound system and making a racket. Hurry up!’
Chills ran spiny fingers down her back again, like a trickle of sweat, bringing with it once more the feeling that she was being watched. She glanced around, but couldn’t see anyone. No sign of creepy guy. Where was he now?
‘I’ll be there in a minute or two.’ Surely Mari could stand to be on her own and not the centre of attention for five minutes. Or maybe not. That was Mari all over.
‘Come on, Izzy. I don’t know anyone else. Hurry up. Oh, they’re getting ready to start.’
The line went dead and Izzy rolled her eyes.
I promised Dylan I’d be there.
At the best of times Marianne could be a bit of a bitch. She couldn’t help it, she always said. It was just the way she was. A handy excuse, but at the same time, Izzy couldn’t recall a time when she didn’t know Mari and Dylan, or when Mari hadn’t been the centre of all attention. Though they were in the same class in school, they only associated because they’d known each other forever. They just didn’t have a lot else in common. Mari was boy-mad these days and Izzy never found anything so very amazing about the boys Mari obsessed over. If the truth was told, Izzy was far closer to Dylan than Mari. And sister or not, often enough even Dylan pretended he didn’t know Mari. Most of the time Izzy could follow suit. Mari certainly didn’t want to know her at school. Mari was … well, Mari.
Izzy slid her phone into her pocket and looked up to find a gap in the sea of people into which she could slot. Her eyes fell on the graffiti on the alleyway wall.
It was right next to her, cut off by railings from this side and a massive bin from the other. About ten feet high, starkly drawn in black and white. An angel. The figure crouched there, her hands clasped nervously before her, balancing on the tips of her toes with her wings outspread behind her, as if at any moment she might take off. She looked over her shoulder, right at Izzy. The eyes ate into her soul.
When Izzy looked closer, the face was smudged, a smear of morning-after mascara, half on the pillows and half on the cheeks. She looked as if she’d been crying. Worse, she looked afraid.
Captivated by the image, Izzy stepped down and dodged through the other pedestrians until she could slip into the alley itself. She squeezed past the bin, trying neither to inhale nor imagine what she might be getting on her clothes. Even Mum and Dad might ask some questions when she’d only had this jacket a couple of weeks.
Her boot scuffed on something as she stepped closer to the wall, a mound of ash, as if a pile of newspapers had been allowed to burn right down there. Izzy bent closer and touched it. A shiver ran up her fingers, along her arm. The angel gazed down, with a Mona Lisa air. She did the eyes thing, her gaze following Izzy wherever she stood.
Izzy stepped away, alarm snaking around her spine, all the way down, crashing against the wheeled bin and sending it skittering out onto the path.
Someone yelled at her, cursed and kicked it back in before they carried on their way. She dug out her phone and switched it to camera. It made that overly loud, false camera shutter noise as she took the picture.
Something hard slammed into the small of her back, pitching her forward, off balance and flailing. She crashed face first against the wall, the black and white graffiti blurring before her eyes. The same something snatched her phone right out of her hand. Pain lanced down her arm, like wires beneath her skin. Without thinking, she launched herself up and after the shambling figure retreating down the alleyway.
The creep.
She couldn’t lose the phone. She just couldn’t. The stupid thing cost too much.
He turned back towards her, giving the impression of a dirt-lined face like crumpled newspaper. The same guy she had seen earlier, the old beggar who’d been following her, waiting for a moment like this.
He stopped dead in his tracks and turned side on, still looking at her. And grinned again. A horrible yellow-toothed grin, far too big for his face.
His image flickered like ancient film, newsreel from a bygone age. Vanishing. Izzy blinked, her mouth dropping open as he started to fade from his head down.
Vanishing, right there, in front of her eyes.
No way!
Izzy dived towards him, grabbing at the place he had been and her fingers closed on the tattered edges of a filthy wool overcoat just before the shimmer of invisibility claimed it too. She felt herself yanked forwards, her feet jerking out from beneath her and she tumbled after him into the alley.
Chapter Two
Jinx
A blast of hot air struck Izzy’s whole body, coming out of nowhere, as if she’d just walked under a shop-door fan. But this air stank of burnt paper and ashes. It sucked the breath from her lungs. Her vision flared, inverting the colours around her and pounding distorted images into her brain like a migraine.
She slammed onto cobbles. The alley, which had looked like no more than a dead end, opened out ahead of her, lit only in patches by a flickering light, the walls and stones slick with a substance that gave them a rainbow sheen. It twisted in and out of sight and it was all wrong …
Her bag spilled from her shoulder, half her things skittering over the alley floor. The old man spoke in a lyric tongue she didn’t understand, trying to yank his coat free of her hand. By his tone and the look on his face, he had to be cursing.
Rage returned Izzy’s voice to her, forced her into action again.
‘Give it back!’ she yelled.
He aimed a kick at her face, but it never connected. He jerked back suddenly, as if something in the darkness grabbed him by the back of the neck and shook him hard. It was dark here, the place thick with shadows that shouldn’t exist on a summer’s afternoon. Izzy’s vision swam and a high-pitched whine cut through her head. Through it she could hear words.
‘What in all the seven hells’ names do you think you’re doing, Mistle? Did you bring her through?’
‘I didn’t mean any harm, Jinx. She came after me.’
A low growl rippled through the air. It shivered against Izzy’s skin, made her stomach dip inside her and then leap up. She let go of the coat, pulled herself up onto her knees. Her brain reeled around inside her skull, lurching sickeningly as she moved.
Concussion? It could be. She’d hit the wall hard enough.
Not to mention seeing him vanish. Had to be a concussion. Her stomach twisted and sweetness filled her mouth. She was going to throw up.
Dear God, she couldn’t. Bile burned the back of her throat, but she forced it down and pulled herself up to stand.
‘Get out of here, you fool,’ said the voice called Jinx.
Was he behind her? How had he got behind her? Was he calling her a fool? No, he was talking to the old man. ‘Don’t prey around here. You’ve been warned enough times. You—’
‘My phone,’ Izzy said, before it was too late. ‘He took my phone.’
There was a pause. She tried to focus on Jinx, but he stood in shadows – and here, in the narrow alley she’d never known existed, the shadows were very dark indeed. They were wrapped around him, hiding him from view. ‘Give it back.’
‘But it’s mine. I did what I had to. It’s pretty. It’s mine.’
‘Give it back,’ Jinx’s voice rippled with menace, like the growl of a tiger on the edge of a nightmare. Even Izzy took a step back.
With an inarticulate roar belying the fawning behaviour of a second earlier, Mistle flung the phone at her. It crashed onto the cobbles, shattering into too many pieces to count.
Mistle didn’t give her a second glance. He just ran, darting through the shadows and down the twisting alleyway, out of sight. His footsteps fell away. In the distance a car horn blared.
Then everything else fell away to silence.
And the sound of the gentle rise and fall of someone else’s breath.
‘You shouldn’t be here either,’ said the voice called Jinx. Strangely melodic a voice. So deep it resonated through her. But not kind. In no way could anyone call it kind.
Izzy’s temper bristled. No, ‘are you okay?’ No, ‘did he hurt you?’ She scowled, searching for him in the shadows. Her vision drifted back towards normality. She could see again, almost. Blinking hard, she tried to focus on him.
‘I’m just fine, thanks,’ she snapped. ‘No harm done.’
Liar. She hurt all over. Not to mention the wound to her pride. What had she been thinking? Everyone knew not to chase thieves down alleys. Instinct was one thing, but what if he’d had a knife? What if he’d had friends?
A vague outline that had to be Jinx loomed over her. Big, broad. And scary, her instincts told her, a little too late to be of any use. This was so not the place to be.
Dropping to her knees she made an attempt to gather her belongings. There was some sort of sludge covering her notebook. She tried to wipe it off, but it clung on stubbornly. Scraping it didn’t work, neither did the crumpled tissue that she found with it.
The sob that tore its way out of her came as a complete surprise. Fat drops of water fell from her eyes and splashed amid the rubbish. Her things tumbled from her shaking hands, even as she tried to scoop them into her bag.
‘Here,’ Jinx said quietly, surprisingly gentle. She looked up to see a pair of long-fingered hands cupped in front of her. Masculine hands, but elegant, like an artist’s. They cradled the broken remains of her mobile phone. ‘It’s banjaxed.’
The apologetic tone made her look up sharply and the first things she saw were his eyes. Sharp as nails, one might say, and the same colour. Bright, shining steel piercing through the darkness. And not quite … normal …
His head tilted to one side, he was studying her as closely as she was studying him. She blinked and the world seemed to contract abruptly around her. The illusion shifted, like the shimmer of a heat haze in high summer and suddenly his eyes were grey instead of steel. His pale skin was framed by strands of long black hair, silken and glossy. Her fingers itched to brush against his face.
His eyes tilted slightly, cat-like, smudges of guyliner giving their grey that curious metallic illusion. No, not a liner. Shadows around his eyes, cast by thick black lashes. Tattoos covered the right side of his neck, kissed the underside of his jaw and vanished beneath the tight black t-shirt he wore. They emerged again, trailing down his arms and she wondered where else they went. The thought of what lay beneath his clothes made her blush furiously. A nose stud winked at her, a silver ring pinched around one high and elegant eyebrow and a line of earrings ran right up the side of one pointed ear.
Not human, not real, she thought once more, like one of those crazy alien things in the films Dylan watched, or something inspired by her manga collection, like a stylised sketch, and the image shifted, normalising again.
Shock was making her see things. That was all. Or that concussion she probably had.
Or maybe just the potentially fatal attack of stupid that seemed to be overwhelming her all of a sudden.
Still pierced, still tattooed, still unbearably handsome, but less … alien? She shook her head, desperate to clear it. Taking a deep breath didn’t help. She closed her eyes, tried again and found her heart pounding in her chest. She breathed past it, felt it calm and looked back at him. Normal. Everything was normal. Or as normal as it got when you were kneeling in a piss-stinking alley with a tattooed stranger.
All the same she didn’t take the pieces of the phone. If shock was making her see things, that was bad enough, but she was still on her knees with a guy who would give her mother apoplexy.
‘Take it,’ he said. His voice carried a sort of lilt she knew she should recognise. It was an old accent, one she couldn’t place. Not local. And yet … not from far away either. She should know it. ‘Maybe you can get it fixed?’
Fixed. Yeah, right. Had he actually looked at it? She tried to shrug. ‘It’s just a phone. I … I can get another.’ There didn’t look to be enough of it left worth fixing, to be honest. ‘Banjaxed’ was an understatement. Thanks to the effect she and her dad had on electronics, she’d seen enough to recognise when something was totally borked. All the same, she held out her bag and he dropped the pieces inside.
Jinx got to his feet, towering over her. Broad-shouldered, slim-hipped, perfectly proportioned.
‘I’m Izzy,’ she said, and immediately regretted it.
He gave her a baffled look, staring at her for a long moment as if he could see inside her. ‘Jinx,’ he said at last. ‘Are you okay?’
That was when Izzy realised she was still crouching on the ground at his feet. Something jerked inside her and she leaped up so quickly part of her was surprised she didn’t hear a string snap. Her head swam and that same peculiar glow she had felt touching the angel surged within her.
‘Yes, I’m … I’m fine …’
The world blurred. Her skin stretched too tight over her bones and her chest caught in a vice. She felt the ground tip and then a hand caught her arm. Strong, but gentle. Careful, but reluctant.
‘Steady. You got up too fast.’
Izzy could only stare at him as if she was an idiot. Any words she might want to say died in her throat. Normally she could come up with a line in a second, something easy and nonchalant, sometimes even funny. Not now though. Jinx released her, his hand still hovering there to catch her again if needs be. But he moved like he didn’t want to touch her for any longer than was absolutely necessary.
Oh my God, pull yourself together, her brain tried to tell the rest of her. You don’t just stand here, some kind of moron ogling the hot guy! You do something, say something, anything!
‘Yeah, I … thanks. I …’ Smooth, Izzy. Really smooth. The sense of uneasiness didn’t pass though. She looked around, half expecting to see creepy old Mistle sneaking up on her again.
‘Maybe you should sit down,’ he said with a wariness that belied the macho image. Probably afraid she’d collapse at his feet. Or throw up on him, she thought, as her stomach gave an ominous heave.
‘Not sure what the coffee’s like here but the seating doesn’t look the greatest.’ She tried to laugh. The sound came out false and twisted. She could see the hardening in his eyes.
God, did he think she was flirting with him? A noise like real laughter floated through the back of her mind, mocking her.
Was she?
‘Can I call someone for you?’ Jinx asked. ‘A parent or a friend?’
A parent? Oh, thank you SO much. ‘No. Really. I’m meeting some friends.’
He frowned, bit back a comment and then nodded. ‘I’ll walk you there.’
Before she knew what was happening, he slipped his hand around her arm in a supremely old-fashioned manner and escorted her out of the alley, only releasing her to let her get by the bin.
That odd shiver in the air passed over her again and the sunlight was brighter as they passed through it. Her skin drank in the warmth with unexpected relief.
Out on the street, the crowd seemed to melt out of Jinx’s way. Or perhaps everyone just avoided him. In the sunlight he didn’t look half as ferocious. She’d been an idiot, panic and her imagination painting a wild image of him. Still, the long hair, piercings and tattoos didn’t exactly cast him as a conformist.
She glanced at his arm while he marched her down South William Street, his feet alternating between the narrow pavement and the road itself, stepping on and off the kerb as needed, completely at peace with his place in the world. His tattoos weren’t black, as she had thought, but a deep indigo blue. Whorls and spirals covered his skin in some sort of tribal design mixed with Celtic knots. It was intricate and beautiful, contrasting strongly with the porcelain smoothness of his skin and the taut muscles beneath it.
‘Where did you get them done?’ she asked.
He frowned, then followed her gaze and snorted briefly, dismissively, as if they were not something to be admired. ‘Got them a long time ago. There are few left who can do those right these days.’ He sounded almost relieved.
Izzy tripped over a rising cobble and he had to catch her again before she fell. His touch made her shiver all over and made the warm spark of whatever it was that had invaded her rise again. But it wasn’t comfortable. It made her want to pull away, to rub at her skin where he had touched her until it was raw. Irritated with herself and with his reticent hero routine, she shook herself free.
‘I’m fine, really. You don’t have to come with me.’
Jinx stopped right there in the path and stared down at her. The other pedestrians flowed around the two of them, like water round a rock, their conversations muted and dim. Even the hum of traffic faded when she looked at him. All she could hear was breath, in and out, and the thundering noise of her own heart.
‘Where were you going?’ he asked, the edge rubbing off his patience. He lifted his hand to the nape of his neck, massaging the tight muscles there.
‘Music shop on Exchequer Street. Denzion are playing at …’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Or at least they were playing at two.’
Jinx laughed, the same dismissive snort that set Izzy’s hackles rising. ‘Denzion, right? Well, maybe you really did have a lucky escape then.’
She’d love to see Mari’s face if she heard that one. Dylan’s band were all she talked about these days. Not for her brother’s sake, of course. She had a thing about the bass player and was determined enough to hook up with him that they all ended up dragged along to every gig and public appearance the band did. Not that Izzy minded.
‘Not a fan, huh?’ She felt a little guilty. But Dylan would understand, wouldn’t he? Or not. Probably not. Guy-pride would see to that. But apart from him the band were pretty bloody awful. Especially the bass-dork. What was his name again? Jeez, Marianne said it often enough.
‘Not as such,’ Jinx said, although his voice softened, and genuine humour inflected it. ‘That guitarist of theirs can play,’ he offered after another moment or two. Izzy’s breath evened out. Dylan, he was talking about Dylan. That assuaged her guilt a little.
‘He can. The others though …’ She shrugged.
‘At least you seem to have some taste to replace your lack of sense. What were you doing in the alley to begin with?’
As if she didn’t feel ashamed enough of her foolishness. She should have known better, even in daylight, in the middle of a city. But with the angel there, she hadn’t thought. Instead she’d had images of art projects at school, of recreating it somehow. All she’d wanted was a photo. Source material and all that. It was such a stupid reason when she thought about it now.
‘I wanted to see the angel,’ she whispered, mortified.
‘An angel?’ His face grew serious. ‘Well, angels are something else little girls should stay away from.’
‘Little …?’ But Jinx smiled, a broad wide smile, and she realised to her greater embarrassment and outrage that he was teasing her. ‘Oh …’ She wanted to stamp her foot and storm away, but that would just confirm it to him, wouldn’t it? That she was just a kid getting into trouble by herself? ‘Very funny!’ she snarled at him and held her ground. ‘What is the angel, anyway?’
Jinx frowned at her, his glower intimidating.
Someone can only intimidate you if you let them, Isabel.
That was what Mum always said. Although the business suits, the multiple degrees and the MBA probably helped. Didn’t matter. Izzy held her ground.
‘Well?’ she asked again, her hands jerking up to her hips so her elbows stuck out at either side. He wasn’t going to answer.
‘Aren’t you already late?’
She could try a different tack. ‘What is Mistle?’
At the sound of the tramp’s name, the corner of Jinx’s upper lip drew up into a sneer. ‘That is someone you definitely don’t want to see again. At best, he’s a petty thief. Back away, Izzy. Mistle and his kind are scum.’
‘And what about your kind?’
Jinx snorted and set off again, striding down the narrow street. Izzy hurried after him, struggling to keep up with his long-legged stride. For a freaking Goth, he moved fast. And here she thought they were all emo vampire wannabes.
He stopped at the junction of Exchequer Street, with the black-painted façade of the music shop on the other side of the road. The city swirled around them, cars, pedestrians, bicycles, all those lives whirling by.
‘Well, there you are. Enjoy.’
A slightly discordant clash of drums and guitars burst out of the doorway and Izzy winced. Jinx’s chuckle made her look up at him.
‘Are you an expert or something?’
To her surprise a smile flickered over his lips. ‘Something,’ he replied. ‘You take care now. I’d best be going.’
She nodded and pursed her lips together. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered and his eyes widened in surprise
Jinx’s face hardened again almost as quickly. ‘You’re welcome,’ he grunted. ‘Go on. They’ll be worried about you.’
That would be the day.
She waited a moment longer, staring up into his sculpted face. His eyes stared deeply into hers, unwavering, and for a moment she wondered if he would lean forward and kiss her. It wasn’t far. If she stood up on her toes she’d be within reach. He’d only have to bend his head, curve his long neck.
His lips parted and before she knew what she was doing, she let her eyelids flutter closed, tilting her face up towards him.
But he didn’t kiss her. Instead he gave the smallest sigh. ‘I’ve got to go.’
Shock and shame flooded through her like icy water. She turned away and crossed the street, head down as she aimed for the door and tried to staunch the sting of mortification.
Jinx’s voice drifted across the sound of traffic and pedestrians. ‘Goodbye, Izzy.’
She turned around as she stepped up onto the pavement and caught a final glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye. He stood there, without moving, staring at her. Only for another moment before he turned sideways. The sunlight flared behind him, blinding her, and then he was gone.
Chapter Three
Old Blood
Jinx let Izzy go reluctantly. She crossed the road, a little slip of a thing with shoulder-length red hair that, illuminated by the sun, seemed too bright to be entirely natural, darting through the traffic and other people. By the time she reached the far side and glanced over her shoulder, he had already pulled the glamour around him, turning sideways to the sun so as to be invisible to human eyes. The girl paused in the doorway of the music shop, gazing back almost as if she could – well, not see him, but still sense him, perhaps? Could that be it? A touch of old blood, perhaps? It had looked like she could see through his glamour, just for a moment or two. But that wasn’t possible in this day and age when fae and humans rarely mixed anymore, let alone interbred. The old blood had largely died out.
His instincts stirred, the deep-seated ancient knowledge of hunter and hunted, intuitive and primal. Standing still as a statue, the late afternoon crowds flowed around him. Light broke through a far off gap in the clouds and fell on her. She glowed with it – special. He couldn’t shake the sense that she was special. And that discomfited him more than he could say. Mistle had already noticed her, after all, and it took something mighty special to get him to crawl out of whatever bottle he was currently drowning himself in.
Even Jinx’s glamour hadn’t worked as fully on her as it should have. Mortal girls blushed and flushed, begging him for attention from the moment he touched them. A fae could always make a human’s blood run hot. It was the way of things.
But she’d fought it. She’d fought so hard. For all appearances, it had barely affected her at all … well, right up until the end.
Why hadn’t he taken advantage of that moment? He breathed out slowly, forcing his body to unwind. She’d looked like something else, something much greater than she was. Old blood, old soul, old and powerful. But she wasn’t. She was just a girl.
Jinx waited until she sighed and turned away. She vanished inside. The sun slid behind the clouds and his world seemed a darker and colder place.
Coincidence, he told himself. Nothing more.
But that was a human excuse. The problem was that in the world of synchronisations all the fae inhabited, there was rarely any such thing.
Unsettled, he headed back home, subtly moulding a path through the crowd of pedestrians who could not see him. A small trick, easily crafted, but one that made life so much easier. Just a case of turning their attention to something – anything – else but him while at the same time making them loath to walk too close to him. Just enough to get them out of his way. From the alleyway it was a short step into the Sídhe-space comprising his home, part of the larger network of Sídhe-ways which made up Dubh Linn. The fae city existed slightly to the left of the human one, overlaid upon it, lurking in the shadows and the forgotten places, the points of intersection where the two converged and all the places stolen away by his people over the centuries. It was grubby and glorious, full of things that never were, the half-dreams of a drink-sodden night. If the gilt had rubbed off it in places, that was only to be expected. Dubh Linn was not for the unwary.
He was suddenly glad he’d shown her the way out.
The club was almost deserted. With all the lights on, it lost its mystery and took on a shabby air. A far cry from the hollows of old, the elders were fond of saying, his matriarch Holly most dismissively of all. Jinx didn’t know and didn’t really want to know. Life in a hole in the ground, miles from the arse end of nowhere, didn’t appeal. He’d always lived in the city, as had most of the fae he knew. Times had changed, another favourite quote among his elders, but in this he was glad of it.
A sound at the open door made him turn. The Magpies stood there, side by side, blocking any chance of escape. They looked alike, dressed as always in pristine black and white, their sharp eyes focused on him and on him alone.
‘Well, now, there he is,’ said Mags, smoothing back his glossy black hair from his forehead.
‘A hard man to track, our Jinx,’ Pie agreed.
‘What do you want?’ he asked, shifting nervously and failing to hide it. ‘Silver’s not here. Club’s not open until later.’ And if Silver found them muscling their way into her domain without permission, she’d have their hides. She was in charge of this hollow.
Mags cocked his head to one side and smiled that heartless smile. ‘Oh, we’re not after a social life. Not yet, anyway. The council’s meeting for a parlay in the Casino. You’re wanted.’
He froze, staring at them. It couldn’t be a lie. Not even the Magpies would risk that. The council operated on a level of mutual distrust and loathing – enemies under a painfully fragile truce – that somehow worked to maintain equilibrium between all the different kiths. Their word was law – or as close to an actual law any of his people would obey. So the council, gathered together, demanding his presence specifically… that couldn’t be good. The Magpies served just one member of the council, the Amadán, and Jinx owed no allegiance to him, a fact for which he was eternally grateful. But a summons from the council … What they want? What did Holly want? As matriarch of his kith, she wasn’t the patient kind. It would bend her nose right out of joint if he shamed her in front of the other members. Especially if Brí was there. It was no secret the two of them loathed each other. And no secret that Jinx had been born in Brí’s hollow and handed over to Holly after the fact. Brí had marked him as surely as Holly, giving a geis to ensnare his destiny instead of tattoos and piercings. They always left their mark, the matriarchs.
He had no choice but to attend. Shame Holly and he might as well hide for the rest of his short and miserable life.
‘Well, we wouldn’t want to keep them waiting, would we?’ he said, as if it didn’t bother him at all.
Mags laughed as Jinx pushed by him, shoulder nudging shoulder, neither of them wanting to give way.
‘There’s a good dog,’ Pie murmured with a snide tone as they followed him out of the hollow. At the back of his neck, Jinx felt his hackles rise.
The Sídhe-ways wound between the human world and the fae one, part of neither and intrinsic to both, in and out of time and space, borrowing minutes here and paying them back whenever. It made travel faster, but it could also mess with time, making an hour seem like a day or a week appear to be no more than an hour. Travellers had to know what they were doing, and even then, Jinx thought as they stepped out of a shimmering heat haze to evening sunlight instead of afternoon, it was too easy to slip up.
Pie cursed and checked his watch, the hands of which were whirling around to catch up with reality. ‘Come on, we’re late.’
Jinx didn’t hurry his gait as they headed across the lawns to the small neo-classical house built in the eighteenth century and quickly assimilated by the Aes Sídhe council so that it dwelt in a neutral area of Sídhe space. Stolen, some might say, or borrowed. Snatched out of one world and into another, but not gone. Not really. It transcended here and there, balanced precariously between the two. The Aes Sídhe loved all things beautiful and deceptive, and it fitted that description. The Casino was only fifty feet square but contained sixteen rooms, and myriad tricks of the eye. Most people translated the name as ‘Little House’ when ‘House of Pleasure’ was nearer the mark. It had never been used for gambling. Well, not for money.
The three of them passed unseen by the thin trickle of unwary tourists heading down the steps to the reception – who barely noticed them, let alone anything strange about their surroundings – and climbed the steps on the northern side to the enormous weathered oak door. Set inside the panels was the actual door, of a more normal size, and it opened to them at a touch. In the main hall, they crossed the highly decorated floor and Pie opened the central of three polished mahogany doors. The air shimmered like a heat haze. Jinx followed Pie, Mags taking up the rear, and they entered through a portal built into the fabric of the house. But like this place built entirely of illusions, the door led elsewhere. The world shifted subtly, shivering like a dog with a flea on its back, and the Casino changed with it, still resplendent and ornate, but now eternally new, gold instead of gilt and dazzling in its beauty. This Casino, on the fae side of the worlds, glittered and the space stretched to accommodate a banqueting hall far greater than possible in the building outside Dubh Linn.
But inside, anything was possible.
Lights hovered beneath a mirrored ceiling, revolving around one another, illuminating the chamber and the table dominating the centre, its surface inlaid with rare woods in intricate, delicate patterns that defied the eye. The three figures sitting around it remained oblivious to the finery of their surroundings. Beside each of them was an empty chair, demarcating the boundaries and distances between them. The largest chair of all, right at the end of the table, was similarly unoccupied.
The Magpies fell behind Jinx as he entered the room. Silver smiled from her place by the silk-lined wall, her hair iridescent in the moving light, her pale grey eyes darting warily to Holly. Their matriarch didn’t deign to notice Jinx yet. She was feeding scraps of fragrant meat to the fae sitting at her feet. She teased him, dangling the food over him before allowing him to take it with his mouth.
He was one of the Aes Sídhe too, the higher nobility of the fae, but that didn’t spare him. Stripes of red scored his back from her crop and he shuddered with a mixture of humiliation and despair as she fed him. His hands remained pressed hard on the polished parquet floor. It was hard to feel any sympathy. Most of the Aes Sídhe who’d ever paid Jinx a scrap of attention in the past had mocked and ridiculed him. But that didn’t make it any better to see one of them so broken now. It just reminded him of the things Holly had put him through over the years. She loved to show her power over those she ruled, especially those who crossed her. She wielded her power like a scalpel. Or a cudgel, when it suited her.
He wondered what this poor sap had done. He didn’t want to know.
Jinx fought to keep the scowl off his face as he watched, waiting for her to notice him. She was his matriarch. Until she did that, he didn’t exist for anyone else in the room. He used the time to study the other members of the council sitting today. Only three members had come, the three who hated each other more than the rest. Yet still they came, and met. Mainly to show they didn’t fear each other. Even if they did. Jinx suspected it made no more sense to them than it did to him.
Brí’s riotous red hair was a marked contrast to Holly’s sleek blonde bob. She was shuffling through some papers, looking anywhere but at Jinx. Brí was as beautiful and terrible as any one of the Aes Sídhe, but normally reclusive.
For a moment she looked so very familiar that something inside him ached and he wanted nothing more than to go to her, to serve her. He’d been born to be her creature, and the blood ran true. His father had died torn between her and the family he should never have even tried to have. And even when Brí had given Jinx to Holly in payment for honour broken, she’d cursed him at the same moment, giving him a geis that made him walk on a knife’s edge in everything he did, one that could see him enslaved or dead in a moment. An obligation. That was the polite term for it. When the Sídhe deigned to be polite.
Her dog. Always. Even when he wasn’t anymore. The urge was too strong. The blood ran true. That was what happened to any pack animal, any hound. And though Holly owned him, though her charms and sigils bound him more firmly to his Aes Sídhe form, the dog would not be silenced completely. It wanted out. Always.
The only other person seated at the table was Amadán himself, an aged man in appearance, but nothing so vulnerable in reality. He ruled alone, without a matriarch, and his followers, like the Magpies, were to be feared.
There was no sign of Donn, naturally, but he never came anymore. Jinx couldn’t remember a time when he had. They kept his place though – wouldn’t dare not to. Donn was the most powerful of them, or so the lore said, the oldest and the most obscure, the dweller in the dark. Jinx had never laid eyes on him. He didn’t know many who had.
Íde, the matriarch of the mountains, hadn’t come in years. Not since her lover, Wild, died right there, at the table, poisoned by an unknown hand. They hadn’t replaced Wild because Íde would never allow it.
And the Seanchaí, the Storyteller as she was sometimes known, was no longer part of the council. She wouldn’t leave her hall, content to sit there and dwell on the future and the past, instead of the now. Her seat at the head of the table would never be used again.
So half the council made up what was left of the council. They governed all the fae in Dubh Linn, of every kind, from the highest to the lowliest, maintaining a fragile peace. Sometimes their hand weighed heavily, and at other times it could not be felt at all.
They were not friends, not even in convenience. This gathering was about the only thing keeping them from all-out war and though it had served this purpose for more years than he could tell, it still didn’t make the atmosphere any more comfortable. No one held a grudge like one of the Aes Sídhe, the nobility of the fae. Hot or cold, they were still at war, and that meant subterfuge, espionage and a variety of colourful assassination attempts were all on the cards. Of course they were. Wild’s death had shown that. It was the way of the Aes Sídhe, as old as time. But equally that didn’t mean they couldn’t meet and be coolly civil. Well, almost civil. Barbed words and one-upmanship were just more weapons in this most lethal of games.
‘Well,’ Holly said at last. ‘It’s about time you got here.’
Jinx bowed his head respectfully. ‘It’s wonderful to see you, grandmother.’ He even sounded like he meant it.
Holly wasn’t fooled though. She glowered at him. ‘Probably a good idea to claim that relationship, Jinx.’
‘Then again,’ Brí interrupted, her clear, bright voice ringing around the room, ‘maybe not. Given that he’s the child of a traitorous mother.’
‘The product of a traitor and an assassin,’ Amadán said with a chuckle. ‘Such a remarkable pedigree for a by-blow.’
Ah yes, his mother the traitor and his father the killer. It always came back to them. Jinx fought to quell the rush of anger inside him. He hadn’t even known his parents, but lived every day with their legacy and the machinations of the very council he faced now.
‘Just so long as he never comes calling at my door.’ Brí poured herself another glass of wine. ‘Blood will out. In more ways than one.’
They all knew about blood. About the spilling of it anyway.
Holly growled something like a curse and stood up, kicking her kneeling slave out of her way. He landed heavily, his face smacking noisily off the parquet floor and lay still, trying to stifle sobs.
They ignored him. It was a kindness that was somewhat unexpected. Clearly his humiliation wasn’t that important to anyone there but Holly.
She stalked towards Jinx and he almost managed not to flinch as she stopped in front of him and slapped his face so hard it snapped his head to one side and left his skin stinging.
Jinx raised his head, but kept his eyes carefully averted from hers. Deferential. Servile.
‘I have a job for you,’ she said.
‘As you command, grandmother.’
