A Crack in Everything

by Ruth Frances Long

  And all it would take to bring him through was a crack in reality, a flaw in the world. Like she was. Something that shouldn’t be, but was nonetheless.

  ‘Forgive me,’ Jinx had said. A plea. A different kind of love in his voice, one strained with regret. She tried to find him, but she met his pain first. It speared her mind and made her gasp in shock.

  Elsewhere Dylan struggled to drag himself towards them and keep on breathing. But he didn’t give up. Couldn’t give up, even if it killed him. She could see into his mind, could read his determination that what was happening before him had to be stopped. And further off, amid the trees, shadows moved, terrified like children when they should have been fierce like monsters. Beneath her hill, locked in the hollow by Sorath’s spell, Brí raged impotently.

  There had to be a way to stop it.

  ‘There is no way. Give up your fight, Isabel. It’s senseless. You’re just a child, too weak, too helpless. And look at him. Look how magnificent we will become.’

  Jinx lifted his head, drunk with pain, and his eyes burned even brighter. His mouth twisted to a cruel and heartless line. He closed his hand around Sorath’s throat and squeezed. But the angel just leaned into it and gasped as a surge of ecstasy made the fire even more fierce.

  No. It’s my throat, Izzy thought. My throat, my body, my life she’s stealing, and Jinx’s she would sacrifice to Lucifer. Her skin burned under his touch and her heart skipped as it tried to beat too fast. Darkness broke through from the place behind the fire. A darkness terrible and eternal. It sought its way out, through her, into Jinx and into the world.

  My body, Izzy told herself. My life. My blood. No more lies. No more tears. No more other people coming to the rescue. It ends here. It has to.

  Her hand flexed, fingers curling according to her own will at last. It moved spasmodically, jerking out and in again, closing around the iron knife.

  ‘Go on,’ Sorath sneered. ‘Kill him again. It won’t matter now. It’s his body we need. It doesn’t have to be alive.’

  No. Not him. She’d never hurt him again. He had saved her, even from herself. But she had Sídhe blood too, right? Brí’s blood. Anything was possible with Sídhe blood.

  And from a distance she imagined she could hear Brí. Yes my daughter, my child, my blood kin.

  She thought of her dad, lying helpless in the hospital bed and Mum by his side, curled up like a child against him, sleeping fitfully. What would happen to them if this nightmare broke free? What would Sorath do to rid herself of Izzy’s last connection to the world?

  Can’t allow it. Just can’t allow it.

  Her fingers locked around the hilt and she pulled it free.

  ‘No, Izzy!’ Jinx’s voice rang out. His own voice, the horror in his face real. He knew. Somehow he knew.

  But she didn’t – couldn’t – hesitate.

  And she didn’t aim for him.

  She drove the knife up to the hilt into her own body.

  Sorath screamed and an answering cry tore up through the earth, through the Wishing Stone and through her, a howl of thwarted rage.

  There was a soft whoomph, like an exhalation of air. Wind lashed the hilltop as figures appeared from nowhere, angels. Angels everywhere.

  And the sudden cold, crisping the grass with frost, infecting the evening with winter’s chill. The shadows deepened, writhed with sudden sentience. The shades and their masters were here too. So many of them, swarming from the shadows with glowing eyes and gleaming teeth.

  Angels and demons, all over the hilltop.

  Izzy’s legs buckled, but Jinx caught her, his arms trembling. His body felt feverishly hot, his skin slick with sweat. He shook as he tried to hold her. But he didn’t let her fall.

  ‘What have you done?’ he shouted. ‘Ancestors, what have you done?’

  Jinx lowered her to the top of the pyramid, lying beside the topmost cube. The knife jutted from her stomach. But it didn’t hurt.

  Izzy stared up at the stars. They seemed awfully close all of a sudden. As she watched, they spun above her, revealing wave upon wave of colours impossible to define, like one of those space telescope pictures seen through the naked eye. So beautiful. So cold. Fire in the heavens.

  There was music, voices, harmonies, sweet and moving. They echoed through her, through the air and through the earth. They rippled up through her, rained down upon her, and the voices of the angels and demons seemed to join in.

  ‘Izzy, talk to me. Please, talk to me.’ Jinx’s voice shook and the urge to leap into the sky above and swim against that current of light and sound faded a little. She focused instead on his face. He might have been carved from marble, he looked so pale. The tattoos stood out in sharp contrast to his skin. So beautiful. He didn’t even realise how wonderful he was. No one had ever shown him that he too was beautiful, a wonder. A glorious never-should-have-been, like her. ‘They’re here. They’re just watching. What are they waiting for?’

  ‘For the end.’ Her voice grated against her throat. ‘They need to know, to be sure. And if we didn’t do it—’

  ‘Why did you do it?’

  ‘Had to do it,’ she sighed and the stupidity of the whole situation flooded through her.

  Something filled her throat and she coughed, a violent racking movement. Then there was pain, pain like she’d never imagined, and blood filled her mouth. She gagged and spat it out.

  Shit. That couldn’t be good.

  Sorath stirred, as angry as a wasp in the back of Izzy’s mind.

  Tied together, Izzy thought triumphantly.

  ‘You idiot,’ Sorath said. ‘You’ve killed us both. I’m an angel. I don’t die.’

  ‘Yes,’ Izzy whispered, resigned, determined. ‘Yes, you do.’ She closed her eyes. ‘And if you don’t, they’ll rip you out of me and we’ll die anyway. So what does it matter?’

  ‘Izzy!’ It was Jinx again. ‘Izzy, don’t you dare go and die. Talk to me! We can get help!’

  ‘No. Too late. Doesn’t hurt.’ A lie, but as she said it the lie became true. It didn’t hurt.

  ‘But you’re a grail. Can’t you … can’t you heal yourself?’

  She blinked tired eyes open, glared at the concern in his face. She wanted to laugh bitterly, but didn’t have the breath.

  ‘Obviously not. You’re a moron, you know that?’

  And God, she loved him for it.

  ‘I should have kissed you when you first kissed me, Izzy. I should have seized every moment. Izzy … Isabel.’

  ‘Don’t. Not Isabel. I hate Isabel.’

  ‘Tell me what to do.’

  Yes, definitely a moron. ‘Kiss me now. And pull the knife out.’

  ‘It’ll kill you.’

  She smiled. That hurt, though it shouldn’t. ‘Yes. Your kisses are bloody awful. You need to practise.’ What did it matter now? She might as well say what she wanted. What she felt. She might as well tell him, before it was too late for words, before—

  Tears hit her face. Not hers but his. Jinx was crying? Not possible. Must be rain. Jinx the cruel, Jinx the caustic … How could Jinx cry for her?

  The angels stirred expectantly, the shades murmured on the edge of hearing. They moved forward, but only to the foot of the pyramid. No further. Izzy frowned, feeling the pressure building in the air around them. Tightening around her skin, squeezing her, until she thought she’d pop. But all she could do was lie there and wait.

  ‘Isabel Gregory,’ said a new voice, one she had half been waiting for. Hoping for. He would have killed her the last time they met, but only the angel interested him. Now she had done the job for him. She was dying and here he was. Come to collect. With the sound of a billowing black cloak, or the unfurling of great wings, Azazel appeared from a twist of shadows, standing on the next level of the steps. The magic warping around the pyramid didn’t hold him back, she realised. Because she was here. And so was Sorath. He held a gold-rimmed crystal bottle in his hands. ‘Are you ready?’

  Information filte
red directly into her mind and she knew what had to be done. The spark couldn’t stay here. This was the only way to get rid of it and rid of Sorath too. She wasn’t afraid of Azazel, not this time. He had what he wanted, or would have it shortly. She gave up the fight.

  ‘Pull out the knife, Jinx.’

  The angels and the shades hissed, a low-level sound that rippled across her senses like sandpaper. He had to do it. When Jinx didn’t move, she closed her own hand around the hilt. But she wasn’t strong enough. It hurt to try, each effort wrenching an agonised cry from her. She twisted in Jinx’s arms.

  He held her still and then closed his hand over hers.

  ‘Just remember I love you,’ he told her. Perfect words, words she’d longed to hear from him. Suddenly nothing seemed to hurt any more.

  The knife slid out of her flesh and with it a golden mist came too. It floated up into the night air and Azazel quickly gathered it up in the bottle and sealed the lid in place. It floated there, like pollen on a breeze, like plankton in the deepest ocean. A perfect element of creation, a primal being.

  Sorath’s voice was gone.

  ‘Where is she?’ Izzy asked.

  There was a susurration of relief from the creatures watching them, infernal and divine alike.

  Azazel tapped the lid of the bottle. ‘She’s in here, where she belongs.’ He glanced up, surveying the attending crowd. ‘Angels are dangerous enough without allowing fallen ones to run amok. You did well, little Grigori. Very well.’

  ‘So well she’s dying for it?’ Jinx growled.

  Azazel shook his head and smiled as he tucked the bottle inside his cloak, out of sight. ‘Always so angry, Cú Sídhe. I sometimes think your first fathers were crossed with a pit bull. The heavens know, you’re ugly enough.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Well, you’ve work to do, girl. Get up.’

  Izzy shook her head. ‘Dying, remember? Stabbed myself.’

  Azazel stuck out his lower lip. ‘Oh well, in that case, don’t listen to your great-uncle. I’m just a foolish old man who was there when your line first came to be. Who has watched and guided your family every step of the way down the long years. We put the mark on you all for a reason, you know. By all means, lie there. But others might have something to say. I think we’re about to find out.’

  A strident voice rang out across the hilltop, getting louder as it approached. A female voice that sounded like she’d just found her best flowerbeds desecrated, or the wrong cutlery used at dinner. A beautiful voice, a stolen voice, and one Izzy had hoped never to hear again.

  ‘What are you doing here? All of you, go away. You’ve no place here. Even setting foot here constitutes an act of war. Before I lose my temper, you’d better—’ The shades were gone in an instant, though the angels lingered. Izzy tried to smile. Even angels wouldn’t last long against Brí. ‘Get off my hill!’

  The same soft displacement of air. And they were gone at last.

  ‘And what do you think you’ve been doing, young lady? Jinx by Jasper, you put my daughter down. Who locked me underground? Not them. They’d never dare. I broke out before and will again and again. No one chains me inside my own hollow. Where is Blythe? What is the meaning—?’

  She must have seen the blood. Or Izzy’s pallor. Or the grief that transformed Jinx’s face into a death mask.

  ‘Get out of my way, demon,’ Brí hissed, passing through the space between them in the blink of an eye. Azazel obliged, stepping back with a gracious bow. Brí ignored him completely. ‘Who did this, Isabel? I’ll eviscerate them. Was it Holly? Was it him?’

  She turned on Jinx, but Izzy stayed her hand.

  ‘It was me.’

  Brí let out a long breath, studying Izzy’s face. The resemblance was there when Izzy really looked. Like it or not, she could see herself in this fairy woman, this matriarch of the Sídhe.

  ‘You foolish child, what were you thinking?’

  Izzy almost laughed, but it made her mouth fill with blood and she choked instead. Now Brí sounded like a mother. Izzy wondered if she realised that.

  But Brí wasn’t in the mood for listening. She bent over Izzy, intent on her injury. ‘Hold still. Stop wriggling about.’

  Yeah, like wriggling was on her mind right at the moment. Any kind of movement at all was agony.

  Brí pressed her hand to Izzy’s side, just as Izzy had done instinctively to Jinx so long ago. It felt natural as breathing – something that suddenly Izzy found she could do again. The pain ebbed away and she sat up in Jinx’s grateful embrace. He buried his face in her hair, breathing deeply.

  ‘Dylan,’ said Izzy. ‘We’ve got to help Dylan.’

  ‘What do you think I am? One of your plug and play contraptions?’ Brí scolded.

  ‘Please,’ Izzy said. Brí’s gaze hardened. ‘Mother.’

  For a moment Brí froze and then her features softened, just for a moment, before the gruff bluster returned.

  ‘Very well, but just this once. You’ll have to sort out your father by yourself. I’m not wanted there and you’re well able to do it. I showed you before. Those doctors – those so called doctors – have done nothing for him and that woman—’

  ‘Rachel,’ Izzy corrected her with a gentle note of warning in her voice. ‘His wife. My mum. Please, Brí, help Dylan.’

  Best not to remind her that she’d met him before, who he’d been with. Best not to mention Silver at all.

  Brí bustled over to him and they followed, Jinx never once releasing her, his arms forming a shield around her whenever he could.

  He’d said he loved her. The thought of that made her glow inside. Not with the fires of Sorath’s obsession. This was warm and natural, a comfort. And so much stronger.

  Dylan had made it to the foot of the pyramid. He leaned against it now, breathing hard without ever getting enough breath. His ribs were broken, Izzy realised, and one at least had pierced a lung.

  ‘You tried to save her, even hurt like this?’ asked Brí in a low voice. He nodded, staring at her in awe and more than a little fear. He knew what she was and what she could do.

  Brí frowned and recognition swept her face.

  ‘You’re the one who was with Silver. But you’re not as you were. You’re full of power … What did she do to you, boy?’

  ‘She… she kissed me.’

  ‘Oh, she did much more than that. You’re a touchstone, a living touchstone. I’ve never seen the like.’

  ‘That’s not possible,’ said Jinx weakly. ‘Nothing mortal can be a touchstone. That’s the whole point. To endure.’

  ‘Are you calling me a liar now? What was that tree of hers originally?’ She glared up at him before turning her attention back to Dylan. For a moment she just stared, shaking her head softly. ‘You won’t last long like this. They’ll be after you like junkies. You’ll only be safe with her. And only for a while. Here, I’ll see what I can do.’

  She bent over him and whispered in his ear as she pressed her hand to his chest.

  Dylan leaned back, stunned, but then nodded. Brí stepped back with a dismissive snort and he struggled to his feet, healed. Or at least mostly healed. He was still bloody and bruised, the gashes still livid on his skin, but he was breathing again, standing, almost himself.

  And he was changed. Completely changed, somewhere deep inside.

  Brí turned away, muttering about the idiocy of people, Silver in particular, and the violation of her home and vanished into the trees without so much as a goodbye.

  Not that Izzy wanted one. It just would have been nice to have an acknowledgement or something. But that was Brí, she supposed. It would take some getting used to.

  Azazel had vanished too, all trace of him and his shades wiped away. He’d taken Sorath’s spark with him.

  They were alone, the three of them, on the top of the hill.

  ‘We need to get to the hospital,’ said Izzy. ‘Get you looked at, Dylan. And I need to see Dad.’

  ‘What about you?’ Jinx asked.

&n
bsp; She ran her hand down to the bloody tear in her shirt, through to the smooth skin underneath. No sign of a wound there. Not even a scar.

  She took Dylan’s hand, and interlocked the fingers of her other hand with Jinx’s, leading them both down the hill. ‘I think I’m going to be okay.’

  ‘Does she always give so many orders?’ Jinx asked Dylan.

  ‘You’ve no idea, mate.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t get cocky. If you really are Silver’s touchstone now, she’s going to murder you for almost dying.’

  The amused expression faded from Jinx’s face. If what Brí said was true, Izzy figured, he was in a lot more trouble than that.

  They picked their way through the dark woods, past walls to no buildings and paths that led nowhere until, almost at the bottom of the wooded area, Jinx called for a halt.

  Shadows moved amid the trees. Not shades or demons. Not now. Cú Sídhe. A bark went up and a young man rose up from the bushes. Izzy grinned as Jinx pushed her behind him. She was becoming incorrigible with all this new-found confidence.

  ‘Blight?’

  ‘Jinx by Jasper. We’ve found you at last,’ Blythe’s brother said, bowing his head respectfully. ‘We’ve been searching for you everywhere.’ He spoke briefly to one of the other hounds, sending word to Blythe no doubt.

  ‘Brí isn’t happy. She wants to know where you were. Sorath locked her in the hill to stop her interfering.’

  ‘Did it work?’ Blight asked, surprised.

  ‘Only for a little while.’

  ‘They tried that a hundred and fifty years ago and it didn’t work then. But yeah …’ He ran his hand through his hair and breathed out in a long exasperated sigh. ‘Yeah, she’s going to be well angry.’

  The largest of the black hounds loped into the path, growing as she circled Jinx. Blythe clawed the dry leaves and then changed into her Sídhe form, standing with her hands on her hips.

  ‘Where the hell have you been? We thought she’d killed you, or that the angels had tracked you down. They all vanished. Just like that. One minute Silver and I were facing them down and the next they were gone. What happened?’