She stroked my cheek. The bed sprang back as she stood.
‘I’ll let you sleep. Love you. Call if you need anything.’
What I needed was a bullet in the skull. Anything to stop the pain.
What I got were dreams.
One in particular. A recurring dream I hadn’t had for months. Inspired by my trip to the beach, perhaps. I rode up silver moonbeams to a forest. Tall, beautiful people, with glittering firefly crowns, greeted me; beckoned to me. When I stepped forward, the ground fell away and I flew, sailing free in the velvet night air.
The stars winked out one by one. Someone flew beside me but I couldn’t turn my head to see who. Below us, leaves on the trees withered and died as we passed. The people vanished like mists, leaving brown death where the forests had been. The world burned.
And I knew it was my fault.
A strong brown hand grasped my wrist in a bone-grinding grip. The street was so far below. Warm tropical breezes lifted my hair. The fingers relaxed. I plummeted towards concrete and asphalt.
My eyes flew open, heart hammering, my skin sticky with sweat. Quiet darkness told me it was still early. Thick curtains obscured the windows and hid the world. Faint, pink-gold light crept in around the edges. The clock said five oh two. I swore at it. The readout ticked relentlessly over to five oh three. Living in the tropics might sound appealing, but the heat and early sunrises sucked for a night-person like me.
I closed my eyes and willed myself back to sleep. A flock of parrots picked that moment to squabble outside my window. Clearly it was morning enough that I may as well get up. Lying in bed would make neither headaches nor my current problem disappear for good.
I sat up. My brain didn’t explode. Thank God. I wasn’t sure I could handle any more like that. Shucking the clothes I’d slept in, still sandy from the beach, I stepped into the white-tiled ensuite and played the age-old game of balance the hot and cold. I stood for ages under the steady stream of water, letting it pound on my shoulders and neck; relaxing muscles made sore by jujitsu and tension.
What to do...
The image of Fynn’s suspicion and doubt last night replayed in my head. What had he seen, though? No more than a girl defending herself against two muggers in a carpark.
Unless he was very observant…
Damn! I had to be sure and I had to know if I’d heard him correctly. I couldn’t walk away from the first chance I’d had in five years of finding out. If this ocair thing was important, I could use it as leverage, get them to leave us alone. Then I could stop living in constant fear of myself and what they might drive me to do.
I groaned. That meant confronting this Fynn guy and there was something unsettling about him. But he was only human. I was perfectly capable of defending myself if he turned out to be some weirdo serial killer.
I left the comforting warmth of the shower and got dressed.
4
I’ve found their target.
No bloody idea. I just met her.
< We need to know who she is. She may lead us to them.>
My thoughts exactly. But she’s... Nevermind.
Home. Sleeping. I should have brought her to you.
Why not? They tried. We need to know who she is. She has potential.
It was too early to contact Fynn, but the alternative – schoolwork – held zero appeal. I gathered my throwing knives and headed for the living room. I put on the coffee percolator and opened the window that looked out over the sea. The air was already thick and warm, redolent of salt, mud, and frangipani, and noisy with the squawk of brilliant red and green parrots clowning around in the trees outside. Early sunlight glittered off the still ocean. Boats of all sizes left white trails across the blue water. A cruise ship’s mournful horn wafted across as the ship inched into port.
Irritatingly picturesque. I closed the window, drew the blinds against the sun and switched on the airconditioner. Anna didn’t much like the outdoors and hated the heat, so airconditioning was as essential as coffee for her. I found the lush smell of greenery surrounding Cairns reassuring and welcoming. The nearness of the rainforests pulled at something primal in me. When we had time, I fully intended to go hiking, regardless of Anna’s distaste.
In the meantime, I had some thinking to do and throwing knives helped. I gathered the knives and paced four metres from the scarred wooden target I’d built two weeks before, on the first day we’d arrived. The rhythmic thwack of metal into wood and the focus required to get the spin right settled my mind. After ten ends I switched to left-handed. After that, I turned my back and spun and threw in one move.
‘Couldn’t sleep?’ My mother, improbably young in blue pyjama shorts and a white t-shirt, with wild, red curls loose to her shoulders and face free of makeup, emerged from her room, yawning. ‘Me neither. Feeling better?’
I nodded.
She inspected the close grouping of my latest throws. ‘Nice. Four metres with a turn-about? What about six?’
I went back to throwing. ‘Not enough space unless I start at the end of the hall. Do you mind being impaled as you come out of your room?’
She chuckled. ‘Just wait ‘til I go to work. But don’t miss. I’d hate to have to replaster the wall again.’
‘Hey! That was ten years ago. I was eight. I don’t miss.’ The rest of her words filtered into my brain. ‘Hang on. It’s Saturday. You’re working today? I thought we were going to the markets later. I have to find you a present for your birthday, on Wednesday, remember?’
The percolator beeped and she poured herself a cup of black coffee. I sniffed the rich scent appreciatively. Her blue eyes watched me speculatively over the rim of the cup.
‘Birthdays are overrated. The markets might have to wait. I told the MJE Board we’d be live with all the changes in six months.’ She screwed up her nose. ‘Means a lot to do.’
Six months. Shorter than many of our stays. But long enough to let me finish senior. There were only three months left.
‘Found a new dojo?’ Anna sipped at her coffee and leafed through a pile of junkmail on the kitchen counter.
‘Two. There’s a good kung fu one two blocks away and a jujitsu one about two minutes from school. I’ll start on Monday. Hopefully no meatheads. They’re harder to resist breaking.’
‘Mmmm…’ She narrowed her gaze. ‘And did you find what you were looking for last night on the work servers?’
Three more knives landed in the target centre before I answered. ‘No.’ The next knife over-rotated with the vehemence of my throw and bounced off, clattering on the tiled floor. I swore. Gathering all the knives I laid them on the glass coffee table and joined her at the breakfast bench.
‘I know you think I’m crazy, chasing after this ocair thing,’ I said, avoiding her eye, ‘but it’s the only lead I’ve ever had. If I can find out what it is, maybe I can give it to them and they’ll leave us alone.’
‘But in five years,’ she said, ‘all we’ve come up with is a similarity to the Celtic word for “key”. Nothing else. And we haven’t seen any indication that they’ve found us again – not for two years. I just think there are more important things you should be concentrating on.’
It was an old argument, so I didn’t bother responding.
She carefully touched my wrist. I suppressed my automatic retreat and glanced up.
‘And last night?’ she asked gently. ‘What happened?’
I hunched a shoulder. ‘Two drunk muggers, that’s all.’
‘You sure? Nothing else? They didn’t hurt you?’ Her grip tightened, her eyes anxious on my face.
I shook my head. ‘Just lost a glove.’
‘But you said something about making a mistake. Was it…like Japan? That bad?’
I shuddered at the memory. T
he pawing of strong hands on my skin. The beer-sweet breath on my face. The seductive drag at life; the burn of power drawn and savoured. The slowing heartbeat beneath my palm.
I stared at the glittering, white and pink granite countertop. ‘No. They weren’t trying to…do anything to me, like that. But almost as bad as Christchurch.’ I looked up at her. ‘I managed to stop it. This time. It’s getting more difficult, though.’
The metal chair legs scraped loudly across the floor as I rose. I strode to the huge living room windows and flung the curtains aside to stare out at the bay and the verdant green hills that formed a backdrop to the city.
‘Every time something threatens me it gets harder not to…protect myself. I can’t help it.’
Anna’s light footsteps hastened across the tiles. Her cool hands fell on my shoulders, hair tickling my skin as she rested her head on my back.
‘Oh, Rowan.’ She sighed. ‘I’m sorry. If it was that close, maybe you should pack.’
I groaned and turned around, leaning my cheek on her shoulder, though I stood half a head taller. ‘I don’t know. They could have just been plain old muggers.’
‘No, I don’t think we should take the risk.’ Her tone firmed. ‘It’s not worth it.’
‘But it just delays things,’ I said. ‘It’s only a matter of time before they track us down again, no matter how careful we are. I just need to find a way to get them off our backs. Then it will get easier to control this. It’s my fear that triggers it, I’m sure.’
Her fingers combed through my hair. ‘You get better all the time, sweetheart. Remember when you used to break glasses just picking them up? And straight out tell people if you saw their death or an accident when you touched them?’ She lifted my chin. Her cheeks were pale, her eyes steady, but with a hint of fear in them that tore at my heart.
‘I know. But controlling myself physically isn’t what I meant.’ I tapped my temple. ‘This is what scares me. Last night I wasn’t even in that much danger. I’d handled things. But it happened anyway. And this time it was like…’ I pressed my palms against my head. ‘Something took over completely. Or I became…no. I don’t know how to describe it. All I know is that it scares the shit out of me. Like there’s something inside me that wants…’ I spread my arms wide then dropped them to my sides, helpless. ‘Everything.’
I sank on to the white leather couch and rested my forehead on my fists. Anna sat beside me, one arm across my shoulders.
‘I know it’s hard, sweetheart,’ she murmured. ‘But I know you. You’re tough and smart. You can control it. You go back to Ireland. I’ll find another city – somewhere bigger so we can be invisible. After you finish senior we can focus on finding out who’s after you, and learning how to hold it together when you’re scared.’
‘It won’t matter.’ I stood and paced the white-tiled floor. ‘Whether it’s here or a bigger city. I hate living like this – constantly running and hiding. Afraid of them – and we don’t even know who they are! Afraid of myself. I know you promised Dad you’d protect me, but I need to have a say in this, too. I don’t want to run anymore. Not unless we absolutely have to.’
‘Yes but—’
‘Just give me a chance,’ I begged. ‘There was a guy last night. He came to help after I’d taken the muggers out. I don’t know what he saw. But he seemed a bit strange about it, and I’m sure he said something about the ocair. I’m going to try and meet him today and find out for certain.’
‘Well.’ Anna sounded doubtful, her sandy brows contracted into a straight line. ‘I might start getting things ready at work, just in case. Worst case, you can go back to Ireland and I can join you in a couple of weeks. I only need two more weeks to put the bones of the MJE changes in place, then my staff can handle it from there.’ She touched my father’s heavy gold and emerald signet ring where it rested on my left middle finger. ‘You’d be safe at his estate for a couple more weeks.’
I hung my head, twisting the ring. ‘I know, but I can’t spend my whole life hiding there. That’s like being in a cage, like some sort of monster. I just want a normal life.’
‘You’re not a monster, Rowan. I’m sorry this is so hard on you. I really am. But you know you’ve always been special.’ Anna held me close for a minute and I rested in the balm of her love, breathing in the security of her familiar smell and softness. Then she leaned back and smiled encouragingly.
‘I could do without being special, actually,’ I said. ‘Ordinary would be nice.’
Anna gave a twisted smile. ‘Not going all teenager on me now, are you. We’ve been doing so well.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘Pretty sure I’ll scrape through one more year without turning into a stereotype.’ I frowned. ‘But while we’re on the subject of special…we’ve never really discussed me, have we? I mean, I’ve asked but you’ve never told me much. I think it’s time you did. Maybe it would help me understand what these people want with me.’
She released me and walked into the kitchen. ‘I’m not sure what you mean, sweetheart.’
‘Yes, you are,’ I pressed. ‘Why am I different?’
Anna poured herself another coffee, not meeting my gaze. ‘Everyone’s unique, Rowan.’
‘Nope,’ I said. ‘Not good enough this time. I haven’t asked for years because I didn’t want to be different. But I am.’
Anna sighed. ‘Alright. But the truth is: I don’t know. Your father was the same, though – different like you, I mean.’
‘So...?’ I prompted, trying to stay calm when my heart jumped in my chest.
She hesitated, then plucked a photo off the fridge. A photo of a pastel done by a street artist when my parents were in Calais. An image of a younger, happier Anna O’Reilly wrapped contentedly in the arms of a handsome, serious Calain Gilmore. They stood in front of the ocean, wind whipping their hair, her cheeks flushed with love and cold.
‘He was...so quick; so strong,’ Anna murmured. ‘I noticed it the first time we met. He saved me from being run down by a car, you know.’
That story was an old one. Anna told it often at social occasions when asked about her absent husband. It was safer and more romantic than his death.
‘At the time, he downplayed it as an adrenalin rush, but it wasn’t long before I saw it come out in other, little ways he probably didn’t notice.’ She smiled reminiscently. ‘When he saved me he sort of sighed and said “so it’s you.”’
‘Well, that’s a pretty bizarre thing to say.’
She shrugged. ‘He was a good man, but there was something about him I could never quite fathom.’
‘What, that he was insane?’ I asked wryly, trying to hide the fear gnawing at my guts – the fear that maybe he’d passed on more than speed and strength to me; that the darkness in my head was also his.
I regretted the comment immediately but Anna reacted with neither anger nor hurt, just with pensive thoughtfulness.
‘No. He always seemed...conflicted, more than anything.’ She sipped her coffee, focussed somewhere beyond me. ‘It’s funny, he was only thirty when we met but he seemed so much older and wiser. He was reluctant to have kids. After three years, he agreed. Said he’d just been delaying so he could have as much time with me as possible.’ Her lips twisted and tears sheened her eyes. ‘He was so happy when you were born. He looked at you and cried. It was the first time I’d ever seen him so emotional about anything.’
‘But that doesn’t answer the question of why I’m different.’
‘No, I know. I’m sorry.’ She swept stray hairs back from her pale, smooth forehead. ‘I’ve been thinking about things he said but he never told me much. I loved him and I was focussed on us and you. I knew you were special from a very early age, though.’
‘How so?’ I selected a bunch of grapes from a bowl on the bench and ate a few without really tasting them.
Anna looked fondly at me. ‘Well, you were saying words by the time you were seven months old. Full sentences by the time you were one.’ She t
hrew me a proud smile. ‘All my friends told me to get you into a genius child course.’ Her expression clouded. ‘But your father insisted we move town. That was the first move we made. He seemed afraid when he saw you were like him.’
‘How do you mean, “like him”?’ My appetite vanished.
Her brow furrowed. ‘By the time you were four, you could speak three languages fluently and you were doing written schoolwork at a grade three level. Plus you and your father had a secret language only you two could speak. To me it sounded like gibberish, but he took you seriously. And sometimes the two of you seemed to communicate just by looking at each other.’
‘Seriously? I can get by in Japanese and French, but three or four languages? What the hell?’
‘I know.’ My mother screwed up her nose. ‘I can’t explain it, either, except that Calain spoke at least twenty I was aware of.’ She laughed. ‘Including Old Norse, for some bizarre reason. In you, though, it all stopped when he went away. You just...stopped and became a normal four year old. Almost. You were sad your dad was gone, but it was like you’d forgotten how to do everything. I was so distraught at the time I didn’t think about it until much later.’ She touched my face, her expression wistful. ‘But when I asked, you just looked at me blankly and said Daddy told you to stop.’
I gaped at her. ‘I have no memory of that, at all.’
She smiled and rinsed her cup. ‘I know. And I know that all these years of running, and not having him around, have been hard on you. So, if you’re sure those two men last night were just ordinary muggers, maybe we can stay. That’s the biggest concern I had.’ She gave me a shrewd look. ‘We’ll plan for both contingencies. But in the last fourteen years since your Dad left, we’ve only run into serious trouble twice. I’m sure you’re right and this is nothing. So why don’t you go find this witness of yours. Then we can be sure of our next steps. I trust your judgment.’ She kissed my head. ‘I’m going to have a shower.’
Relics and Runes Anthology Page 63