‘Where’s Dad?’
‘He stayed on, going over the contract with the lawyer. Did you eat?’ Izzy nodded and then her mum took in the jacket and the bag Izzy carried. ‘Were you going out? At this hour?’
‘I was just … just going over to Clodagh’s.’
It was a small lie and those were okay, weren’t they? Her parents both told enough of them.
‘Not tonight, Isabel, and certainly not so late.’
‘But it’s only—’ She checked the hall clock. Only just after nine. But the tone of Mum’s voice said it all. No arguments. Arguments would lead to questions and Izzy wasn’t sure she could handle many of those. She had to make sure Mum didn’t find out about the tattoo, or whatever the hell it was. That would be a miserable conversation.
‘Okay. I’ll turn in then.’
Mum just stared at her. ‘Did you do something with your hair?’
She couldn’t know. She couldn’t possibly know. Izzy moved her hand self-consciously to her head, where the claw clip still held her hair up in an unruly knot. The back of her neck tingled.
‘No.’
Mum made a bemused sound, not quite belief, not quite disbelief. As if she sensed a change. Izzy didn’t like it. Not at all.
‘Maybe it’s the top. Really brings out your colouring. You look different. Good different.’ Mum smiled and held out her arms. Izzy descended the last few steps into a warm embrace. ‘Sleep tight, mouse. It won’t be like this forever. Promise.’
‘I know.’ Small lies? Maybe. Izzy closed her eyes and tried to pretend she hadn’t thought that. ‘Are you going to get some dinner?’
‘I’ll have something while I wait for your dad. Night night.’
Izzy climbed the stairs and waited, checking the shadows through the chink in the curtain. Nothing moved. Nothing at all. Not until a car turned at the top of the road, its headlights sweeping across the street. It picked out a figure on the other side. He wore a long black coat and Izzy couldn’t make out much more than that before he vanished into the darkness.
She blinked. Nothing there. Had she imagined it?
A chill ran through her, like ants under her skin. Not fear. Not this time. It was more like a warning. A premonition. Like the voice that had whispered to her. But of what, she didn’t know. She crept out onto the landing again, down the stairs, carefully avoiding the squeaky floorboard. She heard the chink of a bottle on the rim of a glass, and the glugging sound of a drink being poured out like a heavy dose of medicine.
Izzy slipped on her shoes. Her breath hitched in her throat as she drew back the latch and pulled the door open. She’d never done anything like this. God, there had never been a need. Nothing had ever felt as urgent. But she needed to see Jinx. She needed to find out what was going on.
Chapter Five
Along the Sídhe-ways
Jinx checked the amp again and played a couple of chords, listening intently to the layers of sound that only one of the fae – or perhaps a mortal who carried a drop of fae blood somewhere deep inside them, or whose musical ability transcended the mundane – could hear.
The tone was everything. It set the whole energy of the night. Silver had taught him that and she’d learned it from the Dagda himself. And no one played like the Dagda. It didn’t matter that Jinx didn’t play the harp. The guitar was a modern equivalent, and in his hands it sang with magic almost as potent as Dagda’s golden harp, Daurdabla.
Tonight, the tone was tight and sharp – tense, irritating. He clenched his jaw and made the necessary adjustments. He knew where the undercurrent of annoyance came from. He’d managed to follow the girl’s trail as far as the train station on Westland Row but then he lost her. No way to tell which direction she’d gone or where she had got off. She might as well have vanished on a breeze. Ironic really. His people were meant to do that, not humans. Even immortals – the angels and demons above and below – left some sort of trace. Izzy had left nothing.
And yet, somehow, he knew she was out there. Knew it deep inside himself, where nothing usually touched him, and he wished with all his heart that he didn’t. He had a job to do and he would find her. He didn’t like it, but he had no choice but to do it. Find her. Bring her to Holly. And to whatever fate befell her there. The Market wasn’t a place for humankind to wander. It wasn’t a place for anyone with half a brain. Only Brí’s domain was more dangerous. As someone who’d had reason to endure both, Jinx wanted to stay clear of them from now on. And that made him angry.
Aggression had no part in his music. The results, if transmitted to an audience, could wreck the place. But longing could be just as dangerous. The fae, especially those of the Sídhe tribes who remembered the War, knew all about longing. Even those, like him, who had only heard the stories of the fall could feel the ghost of the bliss before, could see it lingering in their elders’ eyes, sapping away their joy. Longing reminded them what they had lost, and that was dangerous indeed.
Perhaps that was why the fae, all the fae, celebrated their joys so very hard. Only that could drive the memories away – drink, drugs, sex, partying hard as could be – if only for a little while.
‘Get this into you,’ said Sage. The drummer handed him a beer. Ice cold, dripping with moisture. Better than any fairy brew. Jinx knocked it back. Too late, he saw Silver’s warning glare. She didn’t like them to drink before a show. Pity about that. He drained the bottle with a satisfied growl.
‘It’s showtime.’ She reached out her hands to take his right and Sage’s left, and the others followed suit until they stood in a ring. Jinx hated this part, but there was no telling her. Silver was about as old-fashioned as they came. ‘Dagda guide our music.’ Her voice was a murmur, a rising cadence that shivered through his body, stimulating every nerve. He’d seen warriors weep at her laments, seen their passions rise with her love songs. No one made music like Silver. Her voice was a weapon, even when all she did was speak. ‘Ancestors guide our muse. Bring the fire of truth to our songs.’
Her prayer done, Silver relaxed again and light flooded through her. It filled them all. Without her prayer, Jinx didn’t even know if they could play, not in the way they would play now anyway. Expertise and practice would let them make music, but it wouldn’t be what it could be. What it would be now. It didn’t matter though. While she couldn’t say ‘thank you’, her geis demanded that thanks be given, and that was her way. No different from human superstitions, he supposed. The old gods had left them, the Creator was far away. And geis bound all of the Sídhe, himself included, though his had yet to manifest – No hand but your own can save you, or it will hold you fast.
When Brí handed down a geis, no one got a chance to ask what the hell it meant. She delighted in making them as obtuse as possible. You figured them out at your peril. And you ignored them to your doom.
Silver gave a shimmy, the thin gauze of her dress hiding only the bare essentials, and the stage lights came on in the same instant.
Jinx pulled out the pick from its home amid the strings on the neck of the guitar and began to play, pouring himself into his music, where he could finally forget what he was.
The city centre heaved with its usual Saturday night hordes of revellers, from the fine diners to the stag and hen nights. Recession nothing, Izzy thought bitterly. Her parents seemed to be the only ones affected tonight. Or perhaps partying hard was a way to avoid what everyone knew, to hide from the inevitable.
Off the main thoroughfares, South William Street took on a seedier aspect by night. The arse-end of restaurants and basement sex shops dominated once the other places had shut.
The alley was empty. It smelled not of piss now, but something like battery acid. Izzy stood there, the entrance like a mouth around her, staring at the place where the angel should have been. All that remained of the stunning image was a smear of paint amid the shadows clinging to the fringes of the night.
It was gone.
Disappointment twisted her stomach. How could it be gone alrea
dy? And without her phone she couldn’t even check for the picture.
‘Izzy? Is that you?’
Izzy turned around sharply, only to see Dylan. He was standing at the entrance to the alley, with Marianne and Clodagh trailing along behind him, bemused by the sight of Izzy standing in a filthy alley.
‘What on earth are you doing here?’ Dylan asked, starting forward, reaching out to her. ‘We thought you had to go home earlier.’
‘I was just … just …’ She sighed. What was the point? If she told them they’d never believe her, not the angel, nor the shadows. They probably wouldn’t even think it possible she’d sneak out of home like she just had. She wouldn’t have believed it of herself. They stopped awkwardly, and Dylan let his hands fall to his side. She smiled at him as if she hadn’t a care in the world. ‘What are you guys up to?’
Marianne frowned, suspicion making her perfectly-made-up eyes just a little too beady, but she didn’t ask another question. ‘Clubbing. We’re meeting the band and Dylan’ll get us in. You coming?’
Dylan rolled his eyes and offered her an apologetic grin. Yeah, Izzy could tell how much he was looking forward to the evening with his sister and her friend. ‘Come on, Izzy, you can keep me sane.’
Last thing Izzy wanted was to head off to some nightclub and pretend to be someone she wasn’t for the night, but she rolled her shoulders nonchalantly. She wasn’t dressed for it. Not like Mari and Clo, in their sparkling high heels and skirts that were completely hidden by their short jackets.
She didn’t glitter. Never had. Never wanted to. Even as a kid, pink and sparkles had looked blatantly ridiculous on her. But the clothes she wore now felt like rags. Even Dylan in his black t-shirt, jacket and jeans looked like he was dressed to the nines while she felt like a bag lady.
‘Whatever,’ Mari drawled, her thin patience tearing. ‘We aren’t going to get in if we leave it much later. Come on.’
‘Quit being a bitch, Mari,’ said Dylan in that warning tone he always used with her when she got like this. ‘No one’s impressed.’ Marianne stuck her tongue out at him. ‘Do you want to come with me or not? I can just as easily stick you in a taxi and let you explain to Mum why, as you persuade her to pay the fare.’
Marianne raised her hands in mock defeat. ‘All right, all right, I’ll be the picture of charm.’
Dylan looked far from convinced, but gave her his easy grin. ‘Coming, Izzy? Since you’re here.’ Izzy closed her eyes and reached out to touch the wall. It felt cold and sticky. The mark on her neck tingled and squirmed beneath her skin as if it recognised where it had come from.
And then she heard it. Music. The most amazing music.
Her eyes snapped open and she could still hear it. It echoed down the alley, from the maze of narrow streets and narrower lanes beyond it.
‘Can you hear that?’ Izzy whispered. If it wasn’t real, if she was hearing things or imagining it, she wanted to know right away.
Dylan stepped up beside her, ignoring Marianne’s renewed complaints. His eyes darkened with desire, the pupils dilating, and his face filled with such longing. The music just brushed against Izzy’s senses, but as she looked at Dylan, she saw it consume him.
‘What is it?’ His voice sounded different, strained but at the same time deeper, darker. His whole body tensed with expectation and Izzy felt the urge to touch him, an unexpected, forbidden need. To kiss him.
Cold disgust knotted in her stomach. Dylan? God, he was like a brother. She’d known him all her life.
Clodagh cleared her throat like she had something sharp lodged there.
Izzy glanced over her shoulder and met with Clodagh’s most adversarial glare. She knew that look, saw it whenever Dylan wanted to talk books or music and Clo didn’t have a clue what he was on about.
‘Can’t you hear it?’ she asked.
‘Hear what?’ Marianne said in stubborn tones. But her eyes flickered with the same light as Dylan’s. Izzy frowned. She had to be able to hear it. Why pretend she couldn’t?
She remembered the look on Dylan’s face when she’d told him about the alley, Mistle, Jinx and her phone earlier. He’d urged her to call the cops, but what could she tell them that wouldn’t sound insane? And that was before all the real craziness had kicked off at home. She couldn’t tell them about that now.
‘The music.’ Like a man under a spell, Dylan started forwards into the alley. ‘I can hear music, can’t you? Come on. It’s amazing. We have to find it.’
Izzy’s feet could barely keep up with her headlong rush down the alley. All fear fell away as she and Dylan pursued the music echoing off the stone walls. Mari and Clodagh followed behind, but Izzy barely heard their complaints. Relief surged through her, wild and desperate relief. Dylan could hear it too. She wasn’t going mad.
And at the same time, it felt like they both were.
The music. That was all that mattered. It called her. More, it commanded her to follow it.
Lost in a maze of narrow lanes, she turned this way and that, heedless of direction. Lanes widened to streets, to squares and open spaces. The rational part of her mind veered close to panic. There was no area like this in any part of the city. It looked more like a fever dream of Dickensian London than modern-day Dublin. There was no litter, no chip wrappers, no cans or ripped flyers, but everything felt tattered, dusty, as if it was mostly unused. There were cobbles underfoot, everywhere, and high curbstones lined the edges. The deep gutters glistened with some kind of pungent oily sludge she didn’t want to investigate too closely. The doors they passed were closed, faceless things that gave away nothing. Elaborate fanlights with coloured glass stood over them, unfurled like a peacock’s tail. There were no shops, no neon or chrome, and no sign of anything twenty-first century. It was like stepping back in time. What light there was flickered, orange and uncertain.
And yet it was also like the Dublin she knew, the narrow, forgotten bits of Dublin, the ratty and forgotten corners that wound in and out of the modern city. It was like the type of places Dad showed her, hidden beneath the new world, an older one of magic and wonder, where you could find sculpture, gardens, or murals, or crenellated rooftops, gothic spires and bronze domes. Where stone mice ran around the base of a pillar and stone monkeys played the clarinet. Hidden places. Right in the middle of places she thought she knew.
Admittedly Dad never brought her down alleys that were quite so grim and miserable as this. He would never drag her down here. She ran past buildings which carried echoes of the elaborate red façade of George’s Street, or the grey front of St Ann’s, hints of the hodge-podge of building squashed into the grounds of the Castle painted with the wrong colours, glimpses of jewel-bright stained glass that would have made Harry Clarke’s students weep.
It was beautiful, and terrible, because in that beauty was the constant reminder that none of this should be here. And neither should she.
And then there was a light.
Izzy came to a halt as if she had slammed into a wall made of glass. Dylan swore, his arm lashing out in front of her to stop her if she continued. Mari and Clodagh crashed into them from behind.
‘Where the hell are we?’ Marianne peered past them. ‘It’s weird here.’ She lifted her shoe, examined the sole. ‘Ugh, God.’
A wrought iron Victorian gas-lamp hung over an open doorway, only it had been wired for electricity at some point. Wired poorly. The blub flickered and faded to brown, offering a stuttering illumination. The door beneath it was like a hole into darkness, the top curved in the same manner as the arched sign overhead. Rainbows had long ago been painted along the edges but the paint had faded and flaked away like old dry skin. She could still see the remains of the pattern though, like an after-image on the inside of closed eyelids.
The words had faded too, but once, judging by their edges and the flaked residue around them, they’d been made of gold – ‘The Hollow’.
An inner door opened and the music spilled out louder into the night, its rhythm
harder now, more insistent, but less compelling. As if it knew they were there now, as if it didn’t have to call any more. It was more of an enticement, perhaps a flirtation.
Izzy swallowed hard. They would follow the music. That was inevitable. The music called. Dylan felt it too. She knew it. He stood beside her, her best friend, and she reached out her hand, fumbling as her fingers closed on his sleeve.
A tall figure emerged from the darkness inside, lean and hard, piercings studding his face and ears catching the light. Izzy’s mouth dropped open. For a split second until she blinked he didn’t look … human. Just as Jinx hadn’t.
But she’d imagined that, hadn’t she?
‘Oh, for the love of God.’ Marianne pushed by Izzy and Dylan. ‘You’ve got us here now.’ She made directly for the door, her most confident air radiating from her. And no one could look like she belonged anywhere so well as Marianne. ‘Hi!’
The doorman studied her approach with eyes just a touch too dark for anyone Izzy had ever seen.
‘Mari—’ Instinct thrummed at the base of Izzy’s brain. Something dangerous, something other. The back of her neck had gone icy cold. She just wanted to run. ‘Mari, maybe we should just go and—’
Not to be outdone – especially not in front of Dylan – Clodagh tottered across to join Mari at the door, smiling her brightest, most vacant smile. Izzy glanced at Dylan. His eyes were closed as he listened to the music, transfixed, like a prince in a fairytale ensnared by a spell. Maybe she was the only one who didn’t feel called anymore. She felt warned. The same warning she’d felt back in the house. This was a bad idea. A really bad idea.
‘Who’s playing?’ Dylan asked. Though his voice was soft, it carried in the night air. He sounded like he was high as a kite, which was impossible. Dylan didn’t mess around with any of that. But he sounded it.
A Crack in Everything Page 5