The Wickerlight

by Mary Watson

  THE SCAVENGER HUNT

  Find your treasure.

  A phone number beneath. The flip side is covered in Laila’s untidy scrawl. She’s written what looks, with some effort, like Bad Eye is a Knot. Beneath: standing stones, fairy forts, dolmens, burial stones, ancient trees etc. = nemeta. The word is circled twice. And, bottom right, Find Meadowsweet on School. Wickerlight.

  I pull my phone from my pocket and look up ‘nemeta’. Sacred grove for ancient Celts. Ritual space. Temple. Yup, sounds like Laila. I have no idea what ‘Find Meadowsweet on School’ means. It looks like a note to herself, a reminder. I search ‘wickerlight’ but that’s not a thing.

  Downstairs, Adam is home, cheeks flushed and grass stains on his school trousers. I would think he’s been drinking, but he’s not like that. For all her claims that she’s not religious, Mom doesn’t drink, and Adam is more like her than he’d care to be.

  ‘What was that noise?’ Adam glances up from his maths book.

  ‘Stabbed the wall.’

  He nods, his eyes holding mine briefly, and then he’s back at his books.

  I slip out of the house and into the fading light.

  Our cookie-cutter mini-mansion is on a small private lane. On my right is a dead end. High iron gates and two large cement birds perched on pillars form the entrance to the Rookery.

  I turn left, and head down the gently sloping road to the village main street. Mom’s wrong, Laila wasn’t into drugs. She’d experimented with jimsonweed last summer, hoping to cross the threshold to another realm, but found herself in hospital instead. She’d felt an idiot afterwards.

  Something else made her go down to the village green the night she died.

  I don’t know how long I’m there on the green. Village folk say it used to be an open-air slaughterhouse, that animals were killed and butchered here. That’s why the grass is such a deep shade of green. Because it’s a place for dying. For pigs and sheep.

  And now, for girls.

  I’ve stepped into the road when I hear the noise. I turn, and see a car tearing down. It’s going too fast, veering towards the edge of the kerb. My panic is paralysing. Petrifying.

  The headlights are blinding and I hold out a hand to block the glare as the car speeds towards me. I’m thinking it would really suck if Mom and Dad lost both daughters right there at the village green.

  The car swerves, then swings wildly, pulling to an abrupt stop. My legs are jelly, but I stand there, glaring. It pauses for a long while.

  The car revs, hard and loud. The wheels spin and screech and the car takes off, careering in a circle. It’s dizzying to watch, the car turning at speed, burning rubber into the tarmac. I think I hear the sound of maniacal laughter, but it’s probably just the squealing tires as the car spins. It skids to a stop, and holds for a moment. Then, speeding through the smoke, it disappears into the distance.

  I am rooted in the same spot, unable to move. The car is gone, leaving black rings in the faded tarmac.

  FOUR

  Its name is Promise

  David

  Oisín, pale and disengaged, leans against the wall of the white room at Harkness House. He’s missing a tie and the crumpled suit jacket looks like it was pulled from the bottom of his laundry basket and then stomped on.

  But he’s here, at a Rose party, and that’s something. My brother hasn’t left the Rookery in five months, so skulking in the shadows with greasy, overlong hair and a vacant gaze is a significant improvement.

  HH is swarming with judges. I’m told that in before times, when draoithe weren’t Sundered, we spoke the language of trees, of smoke, water and flame. Mamó believes this absolutely; I have my doubts. One thing is true, we judges sure like to talk. Hard, loud talking where no one is doing any listening.

  Oisín’s eye drifts over the room. There was a time when he loved Rose parties. When he would talk and dance and flirt. But tonight he’s not interested in the women with their glitter and tulle, not the men in suits, not the waiters serving blood-red wine. His gaze roams, then comes to a sudden halt on the newly erected dais.

  He’s staring, have to say it, with creeper eyes. A girl sits up there, quiet and alone.

  Oisín has never met this girl, not even seen her until just now. I doubt he’s even heard of her before this evening. But she’s grabbed his attention. I look at her as if, like Oisín, I’m seeing her for the first time.

  Her name is Wren and she has wavy hair and brown skin. Green eyes that seem to see more than what’s there. She is our newly made Bláithín, the third in our long history. She is the Keeper of the Forest, the girl of leaf and petal. Many judges believe that the third Bláithín brings on the third golden age. And just as the first ré órga gave the judges our superior military strength, and the second brought prosperity, the third promises unfettered silver magic.

  On the dais, surrounded by flowers, Wren looks younger than her eighteen years. She stares ahead, ignoring the room. A single finger worries the embroidery on her dress.

  The Rose circles, sharks anticipating a feed. Smelling blood. Even Dad can’t hide his interest. It’s no secret that she’s not exactly my favourite person, but I almost feel sorry for her up there. How grim it must be, the weight of expectation. The hunger.

  Growing up an augur, Wren has hated us for most of her sorry young life. Sucks for her, because turns out, she’s half judge. The distress this must have caused her is one of my go-to happy thoughts. Her judge half protected her from having her eyes pecked out on the shoreline when she played her little game in the muck ten years ago. No augur can set foot on our land without offending the rooks and because she’d come down our fields unharmed, she’d confounded me.

  But as long as I’ve known Wren, I’ve known she’s wished us ill. I’d always felt it, that intuitive knowing when a threat is near. A soldier’s instinct for danger. But now she’s one of us and I can’t get my head around it. I don’t think she can either.

  From across the room, Dad downs his wine and runs an eye over my black formal uniform, hastily changed in the car. The stiff military jacket, the Bláithín insignia on my armband, feel like binds. If Dad notices the bruise forming on my lower jawline, my newly busted lip, he doesn’t let on.

  ‘Davey.’ Mamó appears beside me, clutching a tumbler of whiskey with her gnarled fingers.

  Heads turn, dresses rustle as a woman enters the white room. Silvery blonde hair swept up, a long shimmering dress, Cassa is every bit our queen. She is not only the leader of our gairdín, the Rose, but of all judges everywhere. Two of her guard, Tarc and Elliot, walk behind.

  That word again. It brushes against me, a light touch of butterfly wings before lifting off.

  I sometimes wonder what it must be like to be Cassa. To be so small and delicate that her enemies could snap her neck with a bare flick of the wrist, and yet the strongest person I know. Her ruthlessness is underscored by that hint of vulnerability and it makes her unpredictable. Adds to her charm.

  Tonight Cassa will announce the four final contenders in the challenge for the highest honour a garraíodóir can achieve: to become War Scythe. Known also as the Raker, the Caretaker, Death’s Song, or, my personal favourite, the Gyve. Which, apparently, means shackle. I’ve spent my whole life wanting nothing more than to be the Shackle. I am a therapist’s dream.

  ‘Your father married the wrong sister.’ Mamó nods at Lucia, my mother, then dismisses her in favour of Cassa, my mother’s half-sister. Though similar to look at, the two women are very different.

  ‘Mamó,’ I reproach her.

  But it’s what she does. Mamó compares. Lucia and Cassa. Me and Oisín. She’s never forgiven my mother for not having daughters to bear the strength of our maternal ancestor, the Crow-Mother.

  ‘Cassa was the better match. Your father, he is …’ She pauses. ‘Hungry.’

  I’m thinking that Mamó is trying to tell me something. I search her face and then I see it. She looks hungry too.

  ‘Mamó?
What do you know?’

  But she just smiles. Mamó is a law unto herself. She is black silk, cigarette smoke and feathers. Two crow-feather combs hold back her silver hair, making her sharp face sharper.

  Pinned to her dress is a round brooch with intricate knotwork. Not an exact replica, but similar enough to the ancient Eye of the Badb. This is Mamó’s way of proclaiming that even though we’re broke and recently disgraced, the famous warrior disc brooch, said to belong to the Crow-Mother herself, is our family heirloom.

  Cill sidles up, smirking at my split lip. He’s smug, not a mark on him. He bends to Mamó, tapping his cheek. He’s the only one she kisses, not me, not even Oisín before he became useless.

  ‘So?’ Cill tilts his head towards Wren, and I just shake mine. No. That’s all I have and I can’t even say it. I don’t know where to begin.

  But then he notices Oisín. I rarely see Cill at a loss, but he’s floundering now as he sees my brother for the first time in months. Since Oisín shut himself from the world. The greasy hair and crumpled suit. How thin he is. But worse is that look in his eyes. Damaged. Lost. Helpless.

  Cill takes a deep chug of his wine.

  ‘Haven’t seen him in a while.’

  I can sense the battle inside. He’s been careful to not pry. But curiosity wins.

  ‘Augurs, right?’

  From the dais, Cassa addresses the room: ‘Good evening and welcome.’

  ‘Around midwinter.’ I whisper this family secret. It’s like by not talking about it, we pretend it didn’t happen. ‘Oisín found augurs on a judge farm, at a megalith.’

  The augurs are constantly trying to steal or destroy our nemeta, the ancient places that fuel our rituals and feed our magic. ‘They ganged up on him. Beat him. Held him for ten days.’

  And whatever happened during those ten days, Oisín won’t say. Says he can’t remember and I’m sure this is true. But I know from the darkness in his eyes that it’s not the complete truth. Because forgetting would have been easier than living with whatever haunts him.

  ‘I know you’ve been waiting for the announcement of the four contenders,’ Cassa continues. ‘But I ask for patience. Because first, there’s someone I want you to meet.’

  Cassa turns and gestures for Wren to stand beside her.

  ‘This is Wren, and she is our Bláithín who will waken silver magic.’

  Cassa’s voice is strong and decisive. With those words, she dismisses Wren’s upbringing as an augur, that Wren came to HH to steal from us, that some judges don’t even believe in the myth of the Bláithín. It may sound like an introduction, but it’s really a warning.

  ‘When?’ a voice calls from the crowd. ‘It’s been more than two months since the changing.’

  ‘Magic takes time,’ Cassa responds. ‘And, as you know, requires ritual. We will prepare and complete the necessary rituals when the time is right.’

  Cassa holds up a hand to silence any more questions. She kisses Wren on both cheeks, a sign of her favour and affection. Wren looks relieved as she steps down from the dais, away from scrutiny, and stands beside Tarc.

  ‘And now, our four contenders. These are the best of our excellent young soldiers facing a once in a lifetime opportunity …’

  As Cassa does the preamble, Oisín stares at Wren. Dad stares at Cassa, gripping the stem of his glass, and Mamó smiles at me. I’d better be among that four. Not only because we’re broke and badly need the money winning will bring, but because our name is mud.

  Only Lucia, my mother, looks down. She’s standing with a group of women, but a little outside their circle. Her face is troubled. But drawn by my gaze, she looks at me, hiding her worry with a brilliant smile.

  ‘Elliot Galvin.’ A garraíodóir from Boston goes up. Cill has the dagger eyes on Elliot. He blames the recently arrived contenders that he’s no longer on Cassa’s personal guard. But Cill’s not garraíodóir. He was only ever a stand-in and has no business being resentful.

  ‘Tarc Gallagher.’

  No surprises here. Tarc’s always been Cassa’s favourite; he’s like a second son to her. But what does surprise me are the disgruntled mutters from the room. They don’t like that Tarc fell for the augur spy, when his duty is to protect Cassa and the Rose from augurs.

  Dad’s now watching me so intently I can almost read his mind: Show us what you’re made of. Are you worthy of your name? Or will you disappoint?

  Mamó places her twisted fingers on my arm. That touch says much the same as Dad’s eyes.

  ‘David Creagh.’

  The relief of it. I want to sink to my knees. Instead, I push through the crowd. Cill’s sister Breanna beams at me. ‘You’re the Raker we need, David.’

  Dogged. Determined. No love for augurs. A Creagh.

  The applause is thundering as I step up beside the others. It’s obvious, despite our disgrace, the Rose has a new favourite. But oddly, it makes me uncomfortable. I catch Wren’s eye as she watches from the front of the crowd, and I get it. That weight of expectation.

  Lucia beams as she applauds, but I’m still seeing a shadow in her eyes.

  Ian is the last garraíodóir to be called up. The four of us stand tall before the Rose gairdín as we recite the pledge. One of our oldest traditions, the contest is open to eligible garraíodóir at the onset of manhood. The title is for life, unless challenged by a usurper. No one ever quits, except Oisín. After his attack he gave it up, and since then we’ve been disgraced. Shunned. Even the judge families who’d lived in our rental houses moved out, escaping the taint of the failed War Scythe.

  All eyes are on my brother in his creased suit as he makes his way to the dais. There are whispers, sneers, from the same people who cheered him on to victory three years ago.

  Oisín carries large red velvet bag which he makes look like a sack of spuds, not some of our ancient treasures. He struggles beneath the attention of so many people. It makes me mad at him, just pull it together for five minutes. But also, that awful heart-sink. He wasn’t like this before.

  Come on, Oisín, I will him forward. The crowd watches, with more than a hint of amusement as he walks towards us.

  That uncomfortable tingling flares up again, demanding I pay attention. It’s a weird, indefinable feeling. An emptiness that responds to the one thing that will fill it. A hunger for something specific but I don’t know what it is. It’s a mosquito buzzing in the dark and you need somehow to stop that infernal noise. There is a word out there, and it’s for me to find. If I don’t, the word will disappear and the discomfort will diminish. But words are power, and any judge’s worth is determined by how many words they’ve turned to law.

  There’s a light laugh from right beside him. Oisín falters and the word retreats. One step at a time, I’m thinking. Just one foot forward, then the next.

  ‘… the state of him.’ The sneer is casually vicious.

  Oisín quails at the centre of the room. He stands motionless for endless seconds. It feels like cracked glass inching out. Broken. Irreparable.

  Then he shuffles forward, slowly. Painfully. Some eyes are kind, some are pitying. He finally reaches the platform.

  ‘Do you return the War Scythe’s trove?’ Cassa says.

  ‘I do,’ Oisín rasps.

  ‘Should you win the contest –’ Cassa turns to the four of us still standing to attention – ‘these treasures will be yours. You will learn the secret rituals to release their hidden magic. They will strengthen and guide you.’

  Three of the four treasures release their magic through ritual. Not the Eye of Badb, which is a Knot. Knot magic requires action. The Eye is the ‘oh crap’ treasure, the one that’s triggered only when the world has gone to hell.

  With shaking hands, Oisín peels open the velvet and takes out a shield, which he hands to Cassa.

  ‘The Shield of Donnacha.’ Cassa lifts the shield, old as a museum piece. ‘For protection.’ She passes the shield to Elliot, who holds it up so everyone can see it.

 
Oisín now takes the lunula, a flat crescent-shaped gold collar with intricate inscriptions, and gives it to Cassa.

  ‘The Seventh Lunula, for command.’

  From the velvet, Oisín draws out the small jewelled dagger that belonged to the first Bláithín, the original girl of leaf and petal who made a desperate deal with the forest. The forest thrummed through her blood, gifting her with powerful magic, and judges have honoured her since.

  ‘The Bláithín’s Dagger. For bravery.’

  Finally, Oisín takes out a black velvet box. Mamó is rigid with pride. In the box is the Eye of Badb, an ancient warrior disc brooch that’s been passed down her family. Because of its power, the Eye is required to be part of the War Scythe’s trove. But it’s really owned by Mamó and she won’t let anyone forget it.

  ‘And for victory,’ Cassa says while Oisín releases the catches on the black box.

  The Eye is said to summon the Crow-Mother, Badb, through the four offerings. It can only be used once in a hundred years. If pleased by the offerings presented, Badb will do whatever is asked of her.

  ‘The Eye of Badb.’

  The Badb Catha is a harbinger of death. She is a battle goddess, who would mess with the minds of the enemy on the battlefield, sending awful visions to distract and destroy. So, I’m guessing she’s most pleased by death and destruction.

  Oisín opens the velvet box. Blood drains from his already pale face. There’s a problem. I can’t see what it is, not from this angle.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Oisín says, passing the box to Cassa like he’s looking for confirmation. As it moves, I see what’s wrong: the box is empty.

  The news spreads fast. The crowd is muttering, craning their necks for a better view.

  ‘I must have forgotten to pack it.’ Oisín’s words are a mumble. I’m cringing, hurting, and without realising it, I’ve broken from position without any heed to Cassa or Dad or the proper decorum.