‘You just think I’m beautiful because I look like you,’ I say.
‘Not any more,’ she says, with something between a laugh and a sob. I reach for her again, get pushed away.
‘Mad, it’s fine. I’m getting used to it, you know?’
I nod. Though I don’t know. How could I know?
Catlin is opening up a drawer, and rifling through it. She pulls out a small, wooden box.
‘Sit down and let me try this.’
‘What?’ I ask, already sitting down.
She unwraps a deck of cards from white raw silk.
‘Let me read for you,’ she says. ‘You’re not the only one who can do magic.’ She wiggles her fingers and makes what I can only describe as paranormal sounds. A lot of whoooooing.
‘Are you going to stop that?’ I ask.
‘Never,’ she says. ‘But look, if you’re worried for the future, this might help. I’ve been trying to learn a bit about the cards and what they mean. I found this deck in the library, and I thought – you know – wouldn’t it be nice to have a future?’
‘It would,’ I say, and when we look at each other our eyes begin to shine, so we look away.
‘I can’t get a handle on mine,’ she says. ‘It’s all “two of swords, death, wheel of fortune”. And I want to know what’s going to happen. Not what has already.’
‘It’s not real though,’ I say.
‘It’s hard to tell,’ she says, ‘what is and isn’t real. Do you ever wonder where you got it from, Madeline? The talent, or whatever it is you have that makes that old bitch want you.’
‘I tried to ask Mam, but she gave me nothing,’ I say. ‘There’s stuff about Dad, but she can’t remember properly. Or won’t. Mamó told me that maybe this … was something I inherited … that Hayes was an old name … And I think that maybe Dad could have been something like I am.’ I sigh. ‘I wish I knew for sure.’
Catlin looks up from the deck, her eyes on mine. ‘I have this memory, of being small, and waking up in the middle of the night. And the walls of the room were on fire. But it wasn’t warm. It was just there – like a film projected on our bedroom walls. But when I reached to touch it, I could feel it. And I don’t remember how old I was, but I was small because we still had railings on our beds. And I don’t remember any more. Just that one flash. That moment. I think that Mamó must be right. That Dad was a witch – or the male term for witch. Warlock, or whatever.’ She rolls her eyes.
‘Mamó calls herself a wise woman sometimes,’ I say. ‘But maybe there are other kinds of witches with wands and hats and things. I mean, it’s possible … you never told me about the fire on the wall. I know you had bad dreams but …’
Catlin’s eyes on the cards, shuffling and shuffling, her knuckles white. There is a pause, and then her voice is small, a little frightened.
‘I didn’t have that memory before. It came back, Mad, when I did. Things feel changed. All warped. All turned around. It’s like there’s more of the world to see, and all the little details bleed together. It’s all these little pictures, but I have to work to make the big one out.’
‘Like a mosaic.’
‘Something a bit like that. And if I remember that, maybe there’s more to come. And we can work on Mam. I mean, we’ve both been through a lot. And I, for one, am fully prepared to milk it.’
‘You have a point.’
‘I mean, I got murdered. Full-on murdered. And you … you’ve given so much to get me back …’
‘Catlin,’ I say, my voice low, ‘I wonder – how Dad died; if he was killed. I mean, in the forest. It sounds a bit … like … what happened with the fox … a sacrifice or something …’
Her face is grim. ‘I see that. Earth and fire. Jesus Christ.’
‘I know,’ I whisper.
‘All we can do is keep searching, and nudging, I suppose. Now, stop terrifying me, and let me read you. Please.’ Her eyes meet mine.
‘OK,’ I say, and watch her small hands shuffling the cards. They’re bigger and thicker than playing cards, and they smell like old books and incense. The backs of them are covered in geometric patterns and stars.
‘Choose three,’ she says.
I do.
She turns them over.
‘Death: that’s probably me. It doesn’t have to be an actual death. It could mean a big change. A metamorphosis.’
‘That could be me as well,’ I say. ‘I mean. I had all of this lovely soul and now I don’t know … Actually, Catlin – this mightn’t work, what with all the soul I don’t have.’
‘You don’t need to have a soul to have a future. I mean, look at Lon – out there, in the great wide open, looking for the next girl.’ She says it like a joke. It’s not a joke.
I don’t know how to respond, so I turn over the next card.
It’s the moon. I stare at it.
‘Is that a lobster?’ I ask.
‘Yes, and a little dog,’ Catlin says. ‘He’s cute. This card is about intuition. And it’s upside down, which means …’ She scrolls through the app on her phone, which is not very mystical of her, but I’ll be knee deep in mystical junk soon, so it’s fine.
‘Insomnia. Unusual Dreams. Mysteries Unveiled. Release of Fear.’
‘Yup. Yup. Nope. Nope,’ I tell her.
‘Well, finding out that you were a witch and that Lon was a serial killer is kind of an unveiled mystery?’ she says.
‘I suppose – there are too many mysteries that still have their veils on though,’ I say.
‘Hmmmm.’
Catlin turns the final card with a flourish.
‘Oh. OK,’ she says. ‘This one I like.’
It’s a big hand appearing in the sky with a stick.
‘I get a wand!’ I exclaim. ‘Or Mamó is going to hit me with a stick. Definitely one or the other.’
‘Shh,’ she says. ‘This is actually a nice one – it’s about potential. It’s, like, the seed of something good is there. Waiting for you.’
‘Oh.’ I look at the hand-stick again, green leaves growing out of it, and flowers.
‘Spring is coming,’ Catlin says. ‘Maybe you should visit Oona, bring her a little present. Like a stick with leaves on?’
‘She would love that.’ My tone is wry.
‘The French love sticks; it’s the same shape as their bread. Facts.’ Catlin says this like she has a doctorate in what French people are like.
‘You’re really good at sounding like you know stuff.’
‘Look. Madeline. You’ve lost your soul. You’ve lost your freedom. You’ve lost a bit of your sister. What else could go wrong? Go get the shift.’
‘Urrrgh,’ I say. ‘Don’t call it that.’
‘What’s the French word? Oh, I know this. Baiser. Go get the baiser.’ She grins.
‘Stop being supportive.’
‘Never. I am going to have a little Pride parade for you in Ballyfrann.’ She cackles. ‘Just me, you, Mam, Oona and maybe Brian all in rainbow colours, marching down main street.’
‘I hate you and everything about you.’
‘No, you don’t.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Now, go get that girl.’
She stares at me. I stare back. Neither of us blinks. I wonder for a second if I have magic unblinking snake powers now that I have no soul, but once I’ve thought that I immediately need to blink and Catlin does a small victory dance.
I send Oona a message, see if she’s around. She replies right away. I smile, and Catlin says, ‘Aww,’ and I tell her where she can go with her patronising little sounds, but it doesn’t come off as seriously as I meant it because I have this stupid big grin still on my face.
I get my coat and walk through the forest. I see the down of birds tangled on brambles. I see the thickets full of green and bright. Everything’s awake, I think. It’s lovely. Slowly I meander through the woods. I meet her halfway up the mountain path. We walk back down together, towards the castle grounds, talking about
everything and nothing. School, and her dad. My headaches and the magic, and how everything has changed, will change again.
She is here, and listening to me, and I am grateful.
I want to ask her about Claudine, but I don’t. I’m not strong enough to be that sort of friend to her just now. I need more distance. We walk till silence falls. I had wondered, whether I’d fancy her now. Without a soul, if there would be a lack of feeling there. I shouldn’t have bothered. I still notice her eyelashes, the way they cast a shadow on her face. So long and dark. The soft look of her skin. I smell her scent.
‘Madeline.’ Her hand brushes my wrist. By accident. On purpose. I don’t know. My stomach lurches, batting at my heart.
‘I think,’ I say, ‘that we should just be friends.’
She looks at me. I look at her.
‘Oona, I like you a lot. I mean, of course I do. You’re amazing. But you don’t feel the romantic stuff as deeply as I do. And that’s fine.’
I’m staring at the trees ahead.
‘But if we … well, I can see it getting harder and harder, and I would hurt, and lose you in that hurt. And I need to be careful right now, because I’m so … I don’t have any more inside me to give.’
I feel the wobble in my voice,
‘Oh, Madeline,’ she says, so gently that it makes me catch my breath.
All she would have to do is reach for me, and I’d lose all resolve. Get lost inside her. But she puts her hands inside her pockets, and we walk through the grounds, beside the wells, around the physic garden. I tell her snatches of what happened. Not very much. Lon killed Catlin, I made a deal. It’s hard to talk about, outside of family. But she gets it, or gets the fear of losing who you love. Her family is strange as well, compared to what people expect from people. I tell her about losing my soul, and how it hurt, like, really, really, hurt, but I don’t notice that pain now; there isn’t an absence. I’ve heard that when people have something amputated, sometimes they still feel it there, a phantom limb. Maybe I have a phantom soul.
When I am twenty-three, I don’t know where or who or what I’ll be. And it’s the same for her. I mean, I could keep hoping. If I wanted, I could keep on hoping.
But I won’t.
48
Mandrake
(anaesthetic, mania, delirium and love)
I am asleep in Mamó’s little box-room. My room now, I suppose. Though I still feel half guest and half employee. I’m trying to stay positive, visualising that stupid hand and stick on Catlin’s cards. I mean, there’s nothing to it, but at this point I’ll take what hope I can. It’s pretty grim here – Mamó’s not big on decor. I’ve put pictures on the walls. Photographs of family, and friends. I’ve organised my textbooks on a shelf above my bed. Mam’s getting me a little folding desk so I can study when Mamó doesn’t need me. It’s OK here at night. For one thing, it’s not as warm as inside the castle. I need my blanket round me when I sleep. My dreams are softer. I can’t see the moon or mountains from my window. Only the garden. There’s a peace in that.
There is a tentative knock at my door. ‘What?’ I bark. Sometimes she gets me up to sort things out. Collecting moss or feathers. Visiting people. She makes me stay in the car most of the time. I’m only being trained. I amn’t ready. I resent that almost as much as the lack of freedom.
The door creaks open. Catlin’s face peeps in.
‘How did you get in?’ I ask, surprised.
‘It was unlocked.’ She’s whispering, and gesturing as well.
I feel like I am in an old black-and-white film about sneaking.
‘You need to come,’ she says, and I say, ‘What?’ out loud, because Mamó clearly already knows she’s here – she got in, didn’t she? Nothing happens here without that woman knowing.
‘Be quiet,’ she whispers. ‘Get your shoes. It’s Laurent. I mean, Lon.’
My heart inside my throat. It beats too fast. I cannot stuff it down. I look at her. Her eyes.
She says, ‘I’m scared.’
We move in silence down the garden path. I can feel the tang of her nerves in the air.
She feels it more than me, I think. I need to keep it together. To weave a world where I am calm and strong.
I follow her. Up the stairs and shut the door behind me. In the castle. Up another flight.
We’re standing in front of Brian’s office door and Catlin’s shaking. Her voice is cracking with the weight of this.
‘Brian asked me to get you. And come to the room inside the tunnel. I don’t know if I can go through that door again. I … I don’t want to see him, Maddy.’
Her voice cracks, though she doesn’t say Lon’s name.
‘You don’t have to,’ I say. ‘You don’t have to do anything Brian says. You have had too many choices taken from you, Catlin. What matters is what do you want to do?’
Her face is miserable, twisted white and red. Her eyes are focused beyond me at something. Remembering, I think. She grabs the door.
‘I think I want to end it.’ I look at her, the blood he spilled still clinging to her skin.
Brian is in his office, next to Mam. He looks taller, I think, than I remember.
‘I want to apologise,’ he says. ‘For not being around the past few weeks. For everything that’s happened.’
The lights are bright. The yellow through the green harsh on his face. I look around for Lon, but Brian keeps talking.
‘It was a shock. I never thought … this is my home. It’s always been a safe place. For me. My father … he was close to Lon. They worked together for a time. I didn’t think that he would hurt my family.’
‘How old is Lon?’ I ask, even though it isn’t that important. Even though I do not really care.
‘Older than he looks,’ says Brian. His mouth tightens. ‘Old enough to know better.’
Mam hasn’t said a word. And now we move. The door sliding open again, and we walk down the passageway. Catlin grips my hand, and I can feel her shaking. We’re quiet, but the mix of panting breaths carves something in the air. I hope that she will be OK. When she sees Lon. I hope she won’t forgive him. Want him back.
The cave is shaped the same. The bed’s gone, the stone scrubbed. You can still see some blood, pinking the grain. It’s hard to get the colour out completely. I see the list of girls upon the walls. And there are so many other crumbled parts that could have once been more names. So many scars through soft bright stone. Things erode here. Things just fade away.
‘This was my father’s place,’ says Brian. ‘I didn’t fully know until he died. All that went on here, the cave. I tried to tell you, at least a little. Something of the truth of what he was.’
Mam snorts. ‘Truth.’
Brian’s voice is soft. ‘Sheila. I know I’ve failed you. I was so afraid that you would leave, when you found out. I even tried …’
I think of foxes, prayers.
He carries on. ‘… but I don’t have his power. Or yours, Maddy. However, there are some skills that I have learned.’
There is a steamer trunk where the bed used to be.
‘He didn’t get too far,’ Brian says, his tone chillingly matter of fact. ‘I think after a while, he knew we’d find him. John Collins … helped. His young lad came as well.’
He topples the box over, the lid flies open. Lon rolls, broken, out. His clothes are stained with dirt and, I think, blood. He looks a mixture of ashamed and furious. Like a wet cat, I think. I notice that he still has on his ankh. We stare at him, while Brian keeps on talking.
I feel like I’m in a horror film or something. When we found Catlin – there was such a panic welling up, such a lot to do to save her, that it muted things. It made them feel, if not more normal, somewhat less abnormal. There is very little more abnormal that staring down at an inhuman thing your stepdad rounded up a mob to capture, bound and gagged on the floor of his secret murder cave.
I look over at Catlin. People say it’s awkward, running into your ex. She doesn’
t look awkward, just very, very vigilant. Her eyes birds’ ink dots focused on a cat, waiting for the flicker of a threat. He’s all trussed up. I think they call it hog-tied, wrists and ankles together at his back. It isn’t very dignified.
‘I’m still not sure,’ Brian tells Catlin, circling Lon, ‘what he is. I know that we were wrong to trust him as much as we did. To allow him to spend time with people who looked his age. To believe the best and not the worst. I’ve made a lot of mistakes these past months, girls. Sheila, I should have told ye what Ballyfrann was, about the community we are – it can be difficult to put it into words. I was afraid that it would put you off me – and then once you were here, time and again I put it off … there’s no excuse for that.’
I keep my eyes fixed on Lon, daring him to move, or speak, or groan.
‘I broke your trust. It will take work to get that back. Those things I know. But, this lad? He’s a mystery.’ He pokes him with his foot and Catlin nods.
‘He is,’ she says. ‘Hi, Lon.’
In my head, I’m wondering if two wrongs make a right. I’ve always felt that the death penalty was a strange one. I mean, to kill a person. Would it not kill a part of you as well, to do that? Because that’s where this is going.
Brian keeps looking at Mam, as if he’s given her a present. And her eyes are sad.
Lon’s not a person though. He is something else. A parasite. A predator. A threat.
‘Be careful,’ says Brian. ‘He is very strong. Even though of course he’s weaker now.’ The now speaks volumes.
‘Where did you find him?’ Catlin’s voice is high. Pretending to be brave.
‘We asked around. The key to Ballyfrann is knowing who to ask. And how to ask.’ Brian is opening a bag. He takes out something sharp, and made of wood. A sword, I think. A long and skinny skewer with a handle. I see the edge of something like a saw inside the bag. The gleam of drill bits.
Brian holds the sword, making sure Lon sees it, before he hands it over to Mam. ‘Could you hold this thing for me, Sheila, love?’
Mam nods. Her eyes are fixed on Lon and they are angry.
‘He was at school with me for a bit. He goes back to education every now and then, you see. For a refresher. My father gave him money. He told me that he wanted to be around people who looked like he did. That the youth club was helping him control the darker parts of who he was. To empathise. It’s hard to look so young and be so old.’ He glares. His features harden. ‘I listened to him because of Dad. Because I thought it’s what he would have wanted. In retrospect, I don’t think he would have cared.’
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