by E. E. Holmes
“It’s a prophetic drawing,” I told Catriona, my voice hollow and resigned in my own ears. “I drew it for the first time about a week ago, on the hospital ward partition the night after Charlie attacked us. And I’ve been drawing it almost every night since. On the walls. On tapestries. On any surface that presents itself to my touch while I’m asleep.”
If Catriona had looked frightened before, it was nothing to how she looked now. She dropped the folder back on the desk as though it had bitten her but continued to stare down at it.
“Prophetic?” she whispered. “But… how?”
I didn’t want to say the words, but how could I avoid it?
“I’m a Seer,” I said in barely more than a whisper. “It’s possible I’ve always been one, since the moment I came into my gifts as a Durupinen. But I didn’t realize it until the weeks after the Shattering. It was then that Fiona helped me realize that the drawings I had done of Eleanora, the Shattered spirit, weren’t spirit-induced. They were warnings, warnings of what was coming. But I didn’t understand it at the time.”
“You predicted the Shattering with your art?” Catriona asked, aghast. It was Catriona who had been the source of the Shattering, the very first Host to be affected.
“Not exactly,” I said. “I predicted who the Shattered spirit was, not the Shattering itself. After we realized who was in the drawings, I assumed that Eleanora must have reached out to me somehow, the way the other spirits do, using me as a Muse. But after the Shattering had been reversed, I had the chance to ask Eleanora how she had reached out to me from the príosún, and she assured me that she had not. There was no way she could have. You know what the Castings are like in that place. She wasn’t able to communicate with anyone. It was only through Cross-Calling with Lucida that she was able to break free. That was after I had drawn her for the first time.”
Catriona closed her eyes and pressed her palms to her forehead, as though she were trying to force the information into her brain and keep it there. “Is that the only time… the only other time that your art has been prophetic?” she asked.
“No,” I said in a tiny voice. “There have been others.”
Catriona did not ask for details. It was quite possible she did not think that she could handle them. It was just too much information to absorb. “Who knows?” she asked after almost a minute’s silence.
“Fiona, Hannah, Milo, and Flavia here at the castle. Finn and Annabelle also know. That’s it.” So far, I added silently in my head. Soon everyone would now, and I’d be the terrifying spectacle of Fairhaven Hall once again, a title I’d successfully avoided for a whopping several months now. It had been nice while it lasted.
Catriona took a breath and turned back to the drawing, looking at it closely for the first time. “This is Skye Príosún,” she murmured, and there was wonder in her voice.
“Yeah, it is,” I said.
“But I don’t understand… It looks like some kind of battle. I see Caomhnóir and…” She looked up at me her eyes wide and horrified.
“Yes,” I whispered. “Caomhnóir and Necromancers, standing together.”
“It’s not possible,” Catriona whispered. “It’s just not possible. They would never… they couldn’t… what does it mean?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “That’s what Fiona and I were trying to understand. Our family’s former Caomhnóir, Finn Carey, is stationed there now. He came to find me at Róisín Lightfoot’s wedding. He wanted to warn me that something strange was going on at the príosún, and that it seemed like the Caomhnóir there were involved in illicit activities. Missing shifts, secret meetings, lying on paperwork about where they were, and how long they’ve been there, that kind of thing. The leadership there told him to let it go, but he couldn’t.”
“Why did he tell you? Why didn’t he go to Seamus, or one of the other Fairhaven Caomhnóir?” Catriona asked.
“He was scared,” I told her. “He didn’t know who he could trust, okay? And he wasn’t sure if his word would be trusted since he had been reassigned for… for breaking protocols,” I told her, tears springing to my eyes against my will.
“What protocols?” Catriona pressed. “Why did he…?”
“Because of me, all right?!” I cried out. “It was my fault! All of this is my fault!”
And the dam broke. All of it tumbled out of me, unbidden but unstoppable. I told her everything: my relationship with Finn; my prophecy at the Traveler camp that led to Irina’s escape; Ileana’s revenge; my illicit conversation with Finn at the wedding; how Bertie’s death had prevented us from passing the information along to Seamus; all of it. And the more that I told, the more I wanted to tell, until every last poisonous drop of the secrets and the lies had drained away, leaving me feeling hollow and empty, but also free. And the last person in the world I ever would have thought to trust was sitting across from me, every one of my secrets now cradled in her hands. Catriona sat in complete silence, her face unreadable, the new keeper of my own personal Pandora’s Box. I watched her, knowing that I had relinquished all control. It would be up to her to decide what would happen now, and as much as that thought terrified me, I also felt an enormous sense of relief.
“So you believe,” Catriona said at last, “that what Finn was witnessing at the príosún, and what Charlie alluded to when he kidnapped us, and what this drawing shows, are all one and the same? That it is all leading to this eventuality?” And she picked up the paper again to stare down at my drawing.
“Yes.”
“Is that why Fiona really went to Skye?”
“Yes. She wanted to contact Finn, to see if she could get a sense of what was happening, without tipping anyone off.”
Catriona shook her head. “Foolish, headstrong woman. She doesn’t have the training for that kind of thing and she knows it. She should have alerted me, so we could’ve sent a Tracker instead. And we have no way to contact her until she gets back?”
I shook my head, my throat restricted with fear. “I agreed not to try to contact her while she’s there. We didn’t want to raise any suspicions. She’s due back late tomorrow night.”
“Bollocks,” Catriona swore under her breath.
Still unsteady on my feet, I stood up.
Catriona looked up at me, her eyebrows drawn together in confusion. “Where are you going?” she asked me.
“You tell me,” I said to her wearily. “Celeste’s office or the Grand Council Room?”
Catriona’s scowl deepened. “What are you on about? Why would we be going there?”
“You’re turning me in, aren’t you?” I asked her. “You’re going to make me show this to the Council and tell them everything that’s going on, aren’t you? You might as well get it over with. We’re losing time here. If I’m going to be publicly excoriated, I’d like to get it over with.”
Catriona snorted. “Not a chance, Jess.”
“What?”
“I said, not a chance. We’re not telling anyone about this.”
“We’re not?” I asked blankly.
“Absolutely not,” Catriona asserted. “Sit back down. You still look like you’re going to pass out.”
Feeling completely wrongfooted, I walked back to the chair and sunk into it. “So… why aren’t you going to tell anyone about this?”
“Fiona might’ve been a damn fool to go to that príosún herself, but she was right. We can’t let anyone know that you’re a Seer.”
I reached for the glass of water and drained the rest of it while I sat and processed this turn of events. Of course, I knew why Fiona would want to keep my role as a Seer secret. Her own mother had been a Seer, and look what had happened to her. It made sense that she, as my mentor, wanted to prevent me from meeting the same fate. Catriona, on the other hand? I wasn’t sure that it made any sense.
“You look like you’ve got something else on your chest,” Catriona said, observing me through narrowed eyes. “If there’s yet another bombshell in this situation I su
ggest you tell me now. I like to know just how deep into the shit I’m going to have to wade before I agree to get my wellies on.”
“I just… I can’t believe I told you all of that. But even more than that, I can’t believe that you’re not marching me right to the High Priestess,” I said honestly.
“Look, I’m not saying that we can keep the lid on this forever, but if we parade this prophecy in front of the whole Durupinen leadership, word is going to get out. And if Mr. Carey is right, and the Caomhnóir have been breached, then we have no idea how far that breach has gone. It’s important to get an idea of what’s going on at the príosún without alerting the Caomhnóir there that we know something is afoot. And while I wish I could have gone and done it myself, I think we should wait until Fiona gets back, and see what she’s found out. It’s only one extra day. Then we can proceed from there. If, at that point, the best way to prevent… whatever this is,” she said, and waved my drawing through the air, “is to let the Council know that you predicted it, then that’s what we’ll do. For now, our excuse will be that you did let the Council know what was going on. First, you told your sister. Next, Fiona. And lastly, you told me. I can take the heat for not bringing it to the wider Council, if necessary.”
“I’m not asking you to take the heat for anything,” I objected. “I’m not trying to get you in trouble by telling you all of this; that’s not why I did it.”
“I know that,” Catriona said. “You’re a Tracker. I’m your superior. This was information I needed to have for our investigation. You provided it. And we will act on it as we see fit. The Council has trusted my judgment in allowing me to oversee this case, and it is my judgment that we sit on this information until Fiona gets back. Is that clear?”
I just nodded my head, still slightly flabbergasted. “Yes ma’am,” I said.
“That’s settled then,” Catriona snapped. “I’m going to make you a cup of tea, and you’re going to tell me everything that you’ve been able to figure out about this drawing. This proves that Charlie Wright’s threats were not just empty words or the narcissistic ravings of a lunatic, and that makes it even more vital that we get this case solved and solved quickly.” She stood up, and turned her back to me, plugging in an electric kettle.
“Oh, and Jess?”
“Yeah?”
“If you ever call me ma’am again, I will flay you alive.”
10
SOS
JESS! JESSICA!
The voice was echoing from somewhere very far away, but even though I could not hear it clearly, I knew that it was familiar somehow.
“I’m here! I’m right here! Who is it?” I called.
Jessica! Jessica, help!
I couldn’t see anything. I was almost completely sure that I was asleep, but that didn’t stop me from trying to respond to the voice anyway. These days, dreams were just an extension of reality, and I’d learned to take them just as seriously as anything that happened to me while I was awake. The last thing I remembered was assuring Milo that I could stay awake until Fiona was due to get back to Fairhaven. I’d been waiting on pins and needles for her for five days, and I wasn’t going to miss the chance to talk to her the second she got in the door. I’d then promptly and thoroughly passed out.
Jessica!
“I hear you!” I cried, though whether I’d said it aloud or just in my head, I couldn’t tell. I seemed to be in that foggy, dim place between sleeping and waking up, when you know you’re dreaming, but you don’t have the power to wake yourself up. “I hear you! Who is it?”
Jessica! Help me, please! Send help !
The voice seemed to be getting further away rather than closer, harder to hear rather than more distinctive. In vain, I tried to open my eyes, but my eyelids were too heavy. I tried to move my arms and legs, but it was as though they were made of lead. All was darkness and stillness, except that voice, which continued to echo from farther and farther away as I struggled to reach it.
“Jess!”
And now it seemed as though two voices were calling for me—one from the far-off distances of my dreams, and one from inside my own head.
“Wait!” I called to the dream voice, which was barely more than an echo now. “Wait! I want to help you!”
Jess! called the two voices at once, blending and shifting and morphing into a single voice.
And in that moment, I knew it. I knew who was calling me from across the far reaches of sleep.
“Fiona!”
My eyelids flew open, and without any concept of how I’d done it, I was standing on my bed, poised to spring off of it and leap into some still undecided upon action.
“Jess! Oh my God, what’s going on? What are you doing?”
I froze mid-spring, staring around me, and my eyes fell on Milo. He was standing beside my bed with his arms upraised, as though he were going to catch me as I prepared to take a flying leap off my bed. The sight of him standing there snapped me out of whatever dream-induced panic I was in. I straightened up.
“What are you doing?” I asked him.
He stared at me. “What am I doing? What are you doing? You’re the one who looks like you’re about to test your ability at the high jump while unconscious.”
“Yeah but…” and I started to laugh, “were you going to… to try to catch me?”
Milo looked at his own outstretched hands in surprise, and then dropped them to his sides, shrugging a bit sheepishly. “I don’t know. Apparently, I was going to try.”
“But… you don’t have, like… actual arms,” I pointed out, stifling another giggle that came bubbling to the surface.
“It was a leftover corporeal instinct, okay?” Milo said, scowling in annoyance as I continued to laugh at him. “I panicked. I wasn’t really thinking, okay? Shouldn’t you just be touched that I would’ve at least tried to catch you instead of just standing here and watching you fall on your face?”
Finding my legs suddenly wobbly and weak, I sunk down onto my bed, still smothering this odd desire to laugh. “Yes, I’m deeply touched that, were you still in possession of a body, you would’ve let me flatten you where you stand.”
Milo cracked a smile. “I’m stronger than I look,” he insisted.
I snorted. “You most certainly are not.”
Milo rolled his eyes. “Whatever. But seriously though, can we get back to the impetus for this whole exchange? What the hell were you doing?”
I rubbed my head, which was starting to ache now. “I have no idea,” I admitted. “Someone was calling to me, I think. In my dream. I heard a voice, but I couldn’t place who it was. And then this other voice started calling me, and the two voices sort of got mixed together…”
“That second voice was probably me,” Milo said, and he drifted over to rest beside me on top of the rumpled blankets. “You started flailing around and freaking out in your sleep, so I tried to wake you up. I thought if I came through the connection that might reach you more quickly—break you out of whatever kind of trance the dream had you in. So, I guess it kind of worked, because you heard me, and a few seconds later, you were awake.”
“Yeah, I did,” I admitted, rubbing my head again. The throbbing was intensifying by the second. “I just wish I could remember whose voice it was. I knew for a second, and then all of a sudden, I was awake, in reality, and I was trying to jump… I kind of lost track of things.” I could feel the knowledge of the voice and who it belonged to slipping through my brain, which felt like a sieve trying to hold on to the details.
“Fiona,” Milo said at once.
I looked up at him, shocked. “What? How do you know that?”
“You said it,” Milo told me. “You said it out loud, right before you woke up. And then you sprang out from under your covers like some sort of jungle cat, prepared to pounce on your prey. I had no idea you could move like that. It was so… coordinated.”
I hoisted an eyebrow at him and said, “Yeah, well, I doubt I could pull off something so coordina
ted while I was actually awake. So, you heard me say Fiona’s name? Are you sure?”
“Absolutely sure,” Milo said, nodding his head firmly. “It was the only thing to come out of your mouth that wasn’t unintelligible muttering.”
Even as he said it, though, I remembered. I remembered the moment when I realized that the voice was Fiona’s. My heart began to thump unaccountably loud.
“Yeah, I remember now,” I said. “Yeah, it was definitely Fiona’s voice.”
“So, you were having a dream about her?” Milo asked.
“I’m trying to remember,” I said, stifling a yawn. My legs and arms felt shaky from whatever ninja-like antics I had pulled off in order to leap to my feet so quickly. “I don’t remember seeing anything, or really any other detail except for her voice. It was just her voice, calling me in the dark.”
“Calling you? What was she saying?” Milo asked.
“Just my name,” I said, struggling to remember. “And… I think maybe she was asking me for something…?”
“Hey, wasn’t she supposed to be back tonight?” Milo asked, his face lighting up as he suddenly remembered.
“Yeah,” I said slowly… “I think… yeah, what day is it?”
“Technically, it’s now Thursday,” he replied.
“Yeah, that must be right! She must be back!” I cried.
“You think she… contacted you in your sleep to let you know that she was back?” Milo asked, looking skeptical. “Is that a Muse thing, or whatever?”
“No,” I said slowly. “No, she’s never done that before. I don’t think that’s a thing that we can do, at least not on purpose. I must’ve just been remembering that she was supposed to be back, and incorporated it into my dream. Still, it was kind of weird… I think she was… asking me for something.”
Milo frowned. “What was it?”
“I can’t remember,” I muttered, closing my eyes, and pressing the heels of my hands hard against them, so that bright white light flared behind my closed lids. “She was asking me… or trying to tell me something.” I let my thoughts dive down, down, down, as deep as they could go into the depths of my own consciousness, grasping around, trying to find the last fleeting edge of my memory of the dream. Suddenly, I caught something, and when I dragged it to the surface and realized what it was, my heart sped up into overdrive.