Hollow Oaks

by Paddy Kelly

  I had just taken the card when the sun broke from behind clouds, into Max's face. She looked up, squinty-eyed, and the sneezes came a second later, one and then another. She caught both in a cotton handkerchief, which she tucked away afterwards.

  "Excuse me," she said.

  I shared a look with the others. Max Grey was a sun-sneezer like us. She had the same brain cross-wiring that allowed bright lights to trigger sneezes, but that also permitted passage through portal oaks. And it was very likely she didn't even realise it.

  "Back to work." She turned on her booted heel and strode off.

  "Thanks," I yelled after her. She gave a backward wave and returned to her group.

  I turned to Gernaud, who was watching Max depart.

  "Maybe you want some string," I said. "So your jaw doesn't fall off."

  He frowned at me but didn't have anything to say in his defence.

  "Are we done?" Debbie said. "It's chilly here. And it looks like rain."

  "I suppose." I looked around a final time. "I'm just not sure what to do next."

  "Next," Debbie said, "we start looking for nuns, and crafters, and portal oaks. Any trail we can think of. And we call Tommy to find out where he heard about Bruno Burke, then we go there too. There's nine hours left until you go to meet Seamus, and we use them all."

  "There's a lot of white vans in Dublin," I said. "More than nuns."

  "Debbie is still right," Gernaud said. "We do what Tommy does. We walk, we ask, we look." He was watching Max Grey as he said it, looking in no great hurry to leave.

  "Come on then." Debbie led the way across the park. Me and Gernaud followed, out through the archway and across the grounds of Dublin Castle, wincing into an ice-whip of a wind.

  She was right. Boots to footpaths was the way to go. They were out there, as was a white van with my dead phone in the back. And every crafter we could track down, every speck of information we could dig up, could let us find them before they found us.

  I just hoped the sticky lethargy left me. Because, as we walked towards the rumble and roar of Dame Street, I was feeling like there was a hole in me, out of which my juice were trickling. And the further I walked, the longer the dark wet line stretched behind.

  My essence, dribbling away.

  CHAPTER TEN

  "You're late," Seamus Cavan growled, holding open the metal door with one hand.

  The alley, to the back of Crafters Lodge, was grubby and dark. Steam lightly flavoured with fabric conditioner drifted from a vent one building up. And it was cold too, proper winter cold, with frost glittering on the pyramid of black bin bags piled up behind us.

  Seamus looked worse than before — pale-faced, dark-eyed, with a flaking rash under his ear. "Sorry about that," I said. "We were busy." I didn't add that we had nothing to show for that busyness, apart from aching feet. "But we're here now. So can we come in?"

  He stepped back and nodded through the opening. "Go, before anyone sees."

  Gernaud stepped up, exchanging with Seamus a surly nod. I had the rucksack, in which we'd brought along the stuff I'd like answers on — Gernaud's copper and amber construction, and the bottle marked uisce beatha from Vesta's house. If anyone could help us work out if this stuff was relevant to the fading anam, and Vesta's death, it was Seamus.

  He led the way, in a slow shuffle. The door clanged shut behind us, and dim lighting led us through a narrow storeroom, where shelves creaked under boxes of ketchup and sugar and napkins. Then in behind the reception desk, where we stopped at a door with a sign declaring private.

  "Take this," Seamus said, handing me a torch. "It's dark where we're going."

  "Okay," I said. "So where's that?" I'd been expecting a sit-down in the room where we'd talked before. But he didn't answer as he unlocked the door and stood back.

  I turned on the torch, squinting. Ahead lay a short passage with bare concrete walls and floor. Two metres in was a metal staircase, spiralling down inside a concrete shaft.

  "That way?" A grunt from behind told me to get a move on. The first tingle of uncertainty came. I glanced at Gernaud, but he just shrugged. So I stupidly ignored my worry and strode ahead to the staircase, hearing the door shut behind me, and looked down.

  There was little to see, only rust-spotted metal that descended into a tangle of shadows and bars. A prod from behind got me moving and, with soft clangs, I descended into air that quickly grew sticky and rat-pissy. With Gernaud and Seamus behind, I moved down three levels, maybe four, in the torch's glare, until I stepped off the last step into a passage as wide as a doorway with a stone floor and brick walls.

  I shone the torch ahead. A few metres along sat a solid barred gate going from floor to ceiling. It was open. "What the hell is this?" I said. "Your nuclear shelter?"

  "Just walk," Seamus said from behind me.

  But I stood my ground, and turned to him. "Where we going, Seamus?"

  "To my secret," he said. "Now walk, McCullough. We're already late."

  Late for what? Were we going to meet people, way down here?

  A stab of pain to my chest. Wait … we weren't being taken to them, were we? To Bruno Burke and sunglasses man? A basement was a handy place for murder.

  That made no sense. But then again, nothing made much sense lately.

  Gernaud nudged me. "Yes," I hissed. "I'm going." I strode through the gate. A few metres beyond it, the passage ended at a door with a soft frame of yellow light around it.

  From behind us came the clunk of a key in the gate. Was Seamus locking us in? I looked back, catching Gernaud's eye. And he looked worried too. What was going on?

  "Knock," Seamus said, tension stretching his voice. I lifted a slow fist to the wood, with its twin rows of pointy-headed black-painted nails. And, as instructed, I knocked.

  Footsteps on the other side, then it opened. The person peering out was a woman in her fifties, with short red hair and a pinched mouth, wearing a lavish silver necklace. And her face … black-shadowed eyes, patchy eyebrows, gums pulling back from her teeth. She was in even worse shape than Seamus, and had a half-crazy look about her.

  "Finally," she said. Her accent was English, possibly a bit Welsh. "Inside, now."

  I heard Gernaud introduce himself as I stepped in, but didn't hear if she replied, because I was too busy looking around the room. Square, with stone walls, it contained a couch, two cupboards, a tall bookshelf, a worn Persian rug. Three bulbs hung from a wooden beam overhead, beneath a stained concrete ceiling. I couldn't guess its age, but the stone walls suggested it was pretty old.

  My gaze snagged on the wall opposite the door. A heavy red curtain hung there, covering what looked like an opening. I stared at it, transfixed, because I could feel something — a sub-sonic groan, a tremble in my belly and bones. What the hell was that?

  A soft clunk as the door closed. But not locked. Seamus shuffled past me, stopping by the curtain. He turned to the lady, who stood a few steps away. "Ready?" he said.

  She nodded. Seamus grabbed the torch he'd given me, then pulled the curtain aside.

  "In," he said. "Both of you. And watch your step."

  I edged into a narrow stone passage with another curtain a few steps ahead. The swirl in my belly was stronger, sending trails squiggling across my eyeballs.

  A poke in my back. "Okay," I hissed at Gernaud. "I'm going. Relax."

  Three steps to the second curtain. I grabbed it, took a breath, slipped through.

  Nausea. A gut-punch. A blaze. I staggered to one side and slapped a hand to a wall to steady myself. Under my fingers I felt not stone but wood, but I couldn't confirm it as I was unable to look away from the churn and squeal of the insanity before me.

  The room flickered like a mad bastard, like a projector breaking down, in yellow, grey, green, lightning white. Below me, stone alternated with earth, flickering beneath the soles of my borrowed boots. I couldn't tell if that floor was tilted, or curved, or if I was—

  "Take care of them, Dónal," I heard Seam
us say.

  An unclear figure stepped up. "Breathe," a deep voice said. "Now, over here."

  The figure, still a blur, took my arm and forcefully walked me around the curve of the wall to the side opposite the opening. A bracelet slid onto my wrist, and the lurching of the room snapped off. In the sudden calm, I looked around, my breath a dry wheeze.

  "Holt shit," Gernaud whispered from beside me. "This is a border zone."

  The desire to protest latest only a second, because he was clearly right.

  A border zone was like a portal oak, a connection to Tara, only room-sized. It matched up with a similar zone on the other side, and when craft items were arranged on both sides simultaneously, the two worlds joined, across a small room. Border zones were … mythical. Things you heard about, not ever actually saw. And yet, here was one.

  I stared at it, amazed. Five metres across, the zone had a stone floor and stone walls, all still flickering, just a little less than before. A battery-powered LED bar hung from a hook behind me, clearly showing what was embedded in the walls — six fat wooden pillars, evenly spaced around the circular space, passing from floor to ceiling.

  Nails of copper or silver had been hammered into the pillars, each of which had either one or two niches hacked into it. Those niches were occupied by jars wound with wires, or carved wooden cylinders. Craft items — batteries of anam. Powering the zone.

  A few niches were empty. So it wasn't fully connected. Not yet.

  "Where are they?" Seamus was talking to his two companions, the woman whose name we hadn't heard, and the man called Dónal, both in the same decrepit state as him.

  "They're coming," the woman said. "They will come, they promised."

  Behind them, the walls were jumping erratically from stone to transparent. And when they were transparent, I glimpsed a shadowy slope, leading up into darkness.

  Seamus stepped up to us, the other two beside him. And even though Dónal looked ill, he was still taller and broader than Gernaud. And he wore a grim expression.

  "Sit," he rasped. I stared at him, trying to estimate my chances of getting past him, into the other room. Where waiting for me was a closed door and a locked gate. Shit.

  "Seamus," I said "Listen, If you tell us what's going on here, I'm sure—"

  "God in hell, McCullough, just do what you're fucking told for a change. Sit!"

  I didn't, and Gernaud, standing beside me, didn't either. A thought had struck me. A border zone was a huge secret, and by bringing us, Seamus was saying that the situation was so bad he'd been forced to, or that it didn't matter as we wouldn't be able to tell anyone.

  That he had brought along unknown backup wasn't a good sign either.

  "We're leaving," I said, icy panic in my words. I stepped away from the wall. "Now if you—"

  The big man, Dónal, stepped in front of me, and jabbed a finger into my chest.

  "You sit," he said, stinking of aftershave and illness and bad breath. "Now."

  "I don't fucking think I will," I said. "Gernaud, come on, we're—"

  Dónal shoved, slamming me into the wall, which I slid down in a daze onto my arse. Gernaud made a lunge, but the big man slapped the hand aside and sent him stumbling back, hitting the wall too with a meaty oomph.

  "Now sit," Dónal said. "And I won't have to break any noses."

  Gernaud sat beside me on the floor, his leg pressed against mine. I didn't need to see his face to know he was feeling what I was feeling — worry swelling into fear.

  "Seamus," I said calmly. "I've things to tell you. We found some stuff—"

  "Shut it," Seamus wheezed. "Lill, they're coming. Let's get this done."

  A line of dark stones divided the room into two halves. We sat in one half, and the exit from the room sat in the other. Red-haired Lill stepped across that line and up to a pillar with two niches, one of which contained a brown jar. On the floor below it sat another.

  Lill grabbed it and slotted it into place. The flickering around us grew more pronounced. Through the walls I saw the slope I'd seen before, but now something was coming down it, in sputtering torchlight. Animals, big and small. And riding them, tiny people.

  Lill stepped to another pillar, placing a brown jar in an empty niche. When it slotted into place, the floor began to vibrate. I pressed a hand to my mouth, afraid I might throw up.

  The exit, I should run, I should—

  She slid the final item into place, purple fire flashed, and silence flopped onto us like a bloated corpse.

  I stared dumbly at what now occupied the other half of the room, behind the line on the floor. Two wolves, with dirty fur and bright eyes. Fat ropes circled their necks, and on each one sat a single fairy. Between the wolves stood a boar, big as a wolfhound. Silver chainmail covered its neck and upper legs. On its back was a fancy saddle, of gold-plated wood, where sat three fairies, one behind and two lower down, in front.

  There was little question about the identity of the fairy sitting at the back. Her fur was a granite grey, unlike Ishbéal's pale blue. Bands of copper and possibly gold encircled her tiny arms, and yellow feathers fanned up behind her, like a blazing sun.

  The fairy queen, and she had me fixed in a needle glare.

  In front of the royal boar squatted three hares, and on each one sat a fairy done up in red and green feathers, wielding a spear. And finally, in front of them, three more fairies, also with spears, standing over a fourth who was kneeling on the packed-earth floor.

  "Ishbéal?" I said, leaning forward. "Seamus, why is she on the—"

  "Quiet," Seamus snapped. He, Lill and Dónal were on the same side of the border zone as us, inside the line that separated hard earth from stone. They had, however, backed up to the wall, leaving the fairies an unimpeded view — and line of fire — to Gernaud and me.

  "Your highness," Gernaud said. "We are so truly honoured that you—"

  The queen snapped "Ciúnas" and he shut up. I weighed my chances of bolting for the door. Unfortunately, there was no door. That whole half of the room was gone. Behind the fairies I saw only a low wall with a gap, and a slope that slid upward into shadow.

  One of the two fairies seated behind the queen spoke in a loud and steady whine.

  "The creature accused," it said, "will now say its words."

  I turned to Seamus. "What the fuck is this? You said nothing about—"

  A snarl caused me to clamp my gob. The big wolf on the left was straining to take a step, being held back only by its tiny rider pulling hard on the rope around its neck.

  "We say it again," the queen's speaker said. "The accused will now speak."

  I was about to ask what I was being accused of, when one of the fairies guarding Ishbéal gave her a smack across the head. She winced and started to speak.

  "I do not know why I am accused. I simply did the queen's bidding—"

  "No!" the speaker barked. "You disobey her at all turns. And you take help of this outgrown in your plots and secrets. You all take part in this, and you all will pay. Show it."

  Movement at the back. A hare, led by a fairy, came forward, with two fat reed satchels on its back. One of the fairies guarding Ishbéal dumped the contents onto the floor, right at the dividing line. A small electronic thing, and … a blue jar.

  I swallowed. It looked like one of those I'd left at the tree stump, with rusting nails inside. And from the reaction of Gernaud, the electronic thing was probably one of the devices he had used to spy on the small folk. They'd caught us both red-fucking-handed.

  "You watch us with your machines," the spokes-fairy said. "And steal our anam—"

  "Great Queen," I said. "You're pissed, I get that." One of the fairies behind the queen was whispering into her ear a running translation. "But we've more important things to discuss, like the anam blockage, and who's burning down houses. If you let me explain—"

  "Silent!" the queen shrieked. The boar she sat on grunted and shook its head, while the wolves on both sides bared more teeth, their ride
rs straining to hold them.

  "Their bag," Seamus said. "Open that, it might show what else they've been doing."

  "You utter bastard," I whispered in his direction. I faced the queen. "You want to talk about breaking trust? So how come you never mentioned the Sidhe?" All of them flinched. "And those caves over there, what about them? You hire me to look into stuff, and don't give me all the information, and then you blame me for finding it out—"

  "Open it!" the queen's speaker yelled. "The greatbag, take it. You, hair of red!"

  Lill stepped forward, with a cautious eye on the wolves. She held out a hand. Reluctantly, I took off my rucksack and handed it over. Lill crouched in the middle of the zone, unzipping. In the few seconds that took, I looked around, desperately, for any kind of plan.

  The exit still wasn't there, eaten up by the fairy half of the zone. Behind me, the LED bar hung within reach, and behind that, the wall had differently coloured blocks, in the rough outline of an opening. A soft tap with my fist showed they were as sturdy as … well, blocks.

  Maybe the craft items in the columns. If I could reach them, I could grab one—

  "Now empty it," the speaker barked at Lill. "Each thing to be held up."

  I counted my heartbeats as Lill reached inside and extracted first Gernaud's shoebox, then the plastic bottle from Vesta's fridge, containing her home-brewed whiskey urge. Lill left the bag on the floor and opened the shoebox. When she extracted the construction of wires and amber, the fairies all gasped.

  "That is a forbidden thing," the speaker said. "A thing stolen from us."

  Neither Gernaud nor me could say anything. Because it was true.

  "And the holder of liquid," the speaker said. "Remove its stopper."

  Lill opened the bottle. One of the fairies guarding Ishbéal stepped up to sniff it, then turned to mumble in Irish. The armoured boar grunted, shaking its head.

  "It's only whiskey," I said. "Uisce Beatha. I was just wondering if—"

  "Uisce beatha," the speaker said. "Another forbidden thing. The guilt is clear."

  The fairies on the floor crouched lower, spears aimed at my face.