‘Traditionally they were a Celtic folk tale – fairies basically.’
‘Fairies,’ spluttered Stiles in disbelief.
‘Oh God,’ groaned Tamar. ‘I think I preferred the vampires.’
‘I thought they were gypsies,’ said Stiles.
‘Perhaps they are,’ suggested Tamar. ‘Maybe they just sort of borrowed the name – er Celtic gypsies.’
Denny struggled to his feet. ‘Let’s go and find out,’ he said.
~ Chapter Three ~
Cindy was sitting up in bed watching TV. She was watching Teletubbies because Jacky had returned and was sitting beside her looking unimaginably smug. Hecaté was standing in the doorway watching him cautiously.
He was singing softly under his breath. ‘If y’ g’ down’ t’ th’ woods t’day …’
Hecaté turned away.
‘Hey,’ shouted Jacky suddenly, ‘whe’ you goin’ lady?’
Hecaté summoned her courage, she was a goddess, she told herself. ‘I am not afraid of you,’ she said.
‘Oh yes you are,’ asserted Jacky.
‘You just watch out,’ said Hecaté. ‘Tamar will deal with you, you shall see.’
‘Not her,’ said Jacky. ‘That nasty lady she nev’r comin’ back now. She gone. They all gone.’ And he started to sing again. ‘if y’ g’ down t’ th’ woods t’day you in f’ a big s’prise …’
Hecaté fairly ran from the room.
It was not Cindy’s child. It could not be! Not that horrible creature. Hecaté thought about his early babyhood. The others seemed to have forgotten, but he had been a sweet loving little thing for a while. That had lasted only a few months really, but Hecaté remembered. So what had happened?
‘Denny would know,’ she mused, ‘if only he were here.’ She shivered, the house seemed so cold and empty without the others, and she felt alone and vulnerable trapped in the house with that thing. ‘Denny would know,’ she reiterated, and then – ‘Denny did know.’ She just had to find his notes.
They had been walking through the densest part of the woods for several hours, when they saw the lights. (They kept calling it “the woods” even though the primeval rainforest atmosphere remained, even intensified – it made them feel better) It was lush, verdant and superficially beautiful, but so terribly menacing that even the usually imperturbable Tamar felt the fear growing in her. They walked in a haze of uneasy loveliness, and had no idea where they might be going. Tiny pinpricks of lights danced like a swarm of fireflies away in the distance glowing green.
‘Like the matrix,’ said Denny to general disdain. But when he commented that he felt like an unwanted intruder on a distant world, neither Tamar nor Stiles disagreed with him, they knew what he meant. They all felt very far from home. The familiar woods had become an alien place, filled with ominous lights and shadows. There was no sound apart from their own voices and the soft tread of their feet.
And the feeling of being watched, which had been growing on them for some time, intensified. But as they walked toward them, the lights seemed to recede and fade then spring up somewhere else.
It was five O’ clock on a winter’s evening, so the sun was going down above the trees somewhere no doubt, although they could not see it, and yet in contradiction of all likelihood, the darkness did seem to increase further.
And yet, the air remained oddly warm and muggy and the ground was muddy beneath their feet, there was no sign of the frostiness that they would have anticipated had they thought about it, but all rational thought seemed to slip away from them and collapse into nervous anticipation. The trees overhead dripped as after a rainstorm, and it was hard to breathe.
Denny was limping badly, but the inner strength borrowed from the Athame * that he always carried kept him going.
* [A demonic dagger that confers supernatural powers on the owner. In Denny’s case, the powers of a Djinn stolen from Askphrit– see “Reality Bites”]
Still, Tamar was worried; it had been a long time since she had seen him like this. And, despite her own considerable powers, she had been unable to help him. What kind of a thing had the power to do this?
Well, that was what they were going to find out.
They continued walking for another half hour without seeing anything except the lights, and then Denny collapsed.
Without warning, several people appeared from behind trees. They looked normal enough, but Tamar and Stiles instinctively formed a defensive barrier between the fallen Denny and the newcomers.
‘Don’t come any closer,’ warned Tamar and the intruders fell back nervously.
There were three women and two men all looked extremely bedraggled and dirty. One woman started to wring her hands and a man clasped her by the shoulders protectively.
‘I think they’re harmless,’ said Denny from the ground. ‘In fact, I think I know some of them.’
Tamar peered more closely at them. ‘They’re from the village,’ she said in surprise. She addressed the man nearest to her. ‘What are you doing out here?’ she said.
‘Gypsies,’ the man said hoarsely.
‘Where?’ snapped Stiles in panic looking around him.
‘No, no, said the man. They sent us to get you. It’s not safe out here.’
‘They’ve been looking after us,’ volunteered a woman. ‘We wandered in … wandered and … I … I can’t remember.’
‘Don’t know how you got here?’ asked Stiles, and Tamar nodded shrewdly.
‘Couldn’t find our way back,’ resumed the man.
‘Couldn’t the gypsies have helped you?’ asked Stiles.
‘They’re stuck too,’ he replied. ‘But at least they’re all together. ‘You come with us now,’ he glanced at Denny. ‘We brought a stretcher,’
Tamar and Stiles walked a little way behind the procession carrying Denny.
‘Do you feel it?’ Tamar said. ‘Something’s wrong.’
‘How did they know that Denny couldn’t walk?’ said Stiles.
‘Crystal ball?’ said Tamar dismissively. ‘But the air feels wrong, thick and heavy and it’s too warm, I don’t like it.’
‘Then you think these are real gypsies then?’
‘Probably. We’ll soon know,’ answered Tamar, in a voice that let Stiles know that the subject was closed.
‘I feel like I’m being watched again,’ noted Stiles, in reference to Tamar’s earlier comments.
‘Yes, but it’s more than that,’ she said. ‘I feel like someone’s reading my mind.’
As they crossed the invisible border into the gypsy camp, everything in the forest felt different. The air was sharp, clear and cold. The ground under their feet crunched, and the trees were rimed with frost. It was like passing into another country.
The gypsies were welcoming. It was like a small court really. Despite the tattered tents and dirty faces, there was a certain tawdry grandeur about the place, a kind of stateliness. A certain decorum was followed and a loose hierarchy appeared to exist. And all this was presided over by a ragged yet colourful king, who had a face like a piece of carved teak (yet the features were more like those usually found carved in marble) perfect manners and a tent to himself with gold braiding around the door flap, and his own blanket.
They were fed and placed by the fire to warm them up. Then the gypsies told them what they knew.
They had been living in the forest for some weeks when their people began to disappear and they saw the strange lights in the trees. They knew that the local people were blaming them for the trouble because lately several strangers had turned up wandering near their camp and told them so, but they swore they had nothing to do with it.
‘It is a power far older than ours,’ they said. But they did not know what it was.
So they had fenced themselves in with spells and charms and, so far, it seemed to be working as long as they kept their vigilance. Sometimes people tried to leave the camp but were always stopped, and the strange lights never entered the camp at night now, but
the gypsies were worried that they would not be able to hold them off forever.
‘We might …’ began Tamar but was nudged into silence by the ever-suspicious Stiles. She had been about to say that they might know what the lights were, but Stiles reminded her to trust no one at this stage. As far as he was concerned, it was either a remarkable coincidence that these “gypsies” had turned up at exactly the same time as all the other trouble had begun, or else they were, at the very least, not telling them the whole truth. If it was not an absolute tissue of lies from beginning to end.
Fortunately, no one seemed to have noticed that she had spoken.
The gypsies did have a name for the strange lights in the forest. “Sidhe”.
‘I thought the gypsies were the Sidhe,’ said Tamar a little later, as they sat apart at the edge of the campfire.
‘No,’ said Denny. ‘We just assumed it because of the way the newspaper article was worded. It never actually said as much. It talked about “gypsy outrages” and then later mentioned the name Sidhe as the one people mentioned when they returned’
‘So, it’s a coincidence?’
Stiles snorted sceptically.
Tamar nodded. She did not think so either.
Later that night, around midnight, when the camp was silent, Tamar was filled with a sudden urgent desire to wander into the forest. Why, she could not have said, even if questioned at the time – later she was to be equally uncertain.
Stiles – who was born vigilant – saw her go and silently followed her. He did not wake Denny who, unable to walk, would only have slowed him down.
After she had walked about 400 yards Tamar stopped abruptly and, without turning round, said, ‘I know you’re there Jack.’
‘Damn! I was sure I didn’t make a noise,’ he thought.
She turned to face him ‘I didn’t hear you,’ she said as if reading his thoughts. ‘I just knew. I knew you would follow me.’
She moved toward him slowly. ‘And now we’re alone,’ she said. There was no mistaking her meaning; it was in the tone of her voice. She sounded … seductive.
Stiles immediately became nervous. ‘A-alone?’ he stammered. ‘Are you sure, that’s a good idea … out here I mean …?’ he gestured vaguely around him.
Tamar was beautiful even by ordinary standards – even by supermodel standards – but Stiles had got used to it by now – or thought he had. Ha! Who did he think he was he kidding?
She was standing completely still surrounded by a glowing eldritch light which made her look oddly fragile (arousing feelings of protectiveness in Stiles that he had never had before in relation to Tamar, who was a girl who could take care of herself) and so beautiful that she took his breath away.
‘Better than mortal man deserves?’ she said reading his mind again.
‘I never saw anything so beautiful,’ he agreed. ‘I never met anyone like you,’ he told her moving closer. ‘You’re not just beautiful, you’re brave and clever and you care, and I think – I think that somehow it shines through. You’re beautiful all the way down in your soul, and it shows through. Your beauty really does come from within.’
Tamar raised an eyebrow. Even under the influence of the spell she was surprised at this glowing rhetoric coming from the relatively stolid Stiles, who had probably never said words like that before in his entire life, or even thought of them. Also, she knew that it was all cobblers. Tamar was a tough bitch, and she knew it. But she was moved all the same.
Her head was swimming; the dank and horrible forest had taken on a rosy hue, and she was sure that she could hear the swell of an orchestra. Little birdies were tweeting, and she was vaguely aware of what sounded suspiciously like crashing waves (and they were at least seventy miles from the ocean). There were rose petals.
‘There’ll be champagne next,’ though the tiny cynical core of Tamar that never quite surrendered.
‘Jack,’ she said softly. Are you saying what I think you’re saying?’
‘I’m not good enough for you,’ he answered.
‘I think you are,’ she said. ‘I always thought you were a remarkable man.’
‘Really?’
‘Oh yes, and far too modest.’
‘I’m getting old now,’ he said. ‘And I never was handsome even when I was young.’
Tamar denied it. ‘Yes you are,’ she said. ‘Sort of. I think so anyway. From what I hear, handsome is as handsome does, you know. And it must be true ’cause look at you.’
‘That’s just an old saying,’ said Stiles.
‘Well, if there’s even a grain of truth in it, then you must be far handsomer than me,’
Stiles was looking at her uncertainly. ‘Do you really mean all this?’ he said. ‘I mean, it seems like … I dunno. You’ve never said … I think maybe you don’t know what you’re saying. I can’t … take advantage of you if you’re well … not yourself maybe … or … I dunno …’ he trailed off.
She smiled. ‘Jack …’ she reached for him.
‘No! It isn’t a good idea,’ he said weakly. And he untwined her arms from about his neck with shaking fingers.
She pouted irresistibly. ‘If you don’t want me, just say so,’ she said. ‘But I know that you do.’
‘Tamar …’ He put his arms around her. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’
She kissed him, and the world spun.
He said. ‘I love you.’
This was ludicrous, and the spell broke. Tamar pulled back, and they just stared at each other dumbly.
‘That wasn’t real, was it?’ said Stiles eventually, as if he was not certain.
‘No!’ said Tamar a little too emphatically.
‘Only… it kind of felt real,’ he said.
‘You mean apart from the fact that it clearly wasn’t,’ said Tamar acerbically. Rose petals!
‘Well, yeah, apart from that.’
‘You and I don’t say those kinds of things, especially to each other.’
‘I know,’
‘It was a spell. Something got inside our heads and made us say that stuff.’
‘I know, but …’
‘Yeah, but … You tried it on with me once before I seem to remember,’ she added.
‘And you told me that you would have let me, if it wasn’t for Denny,’ he reminded her.’
This was true.
‘So … was it real, or not?’ she wondered.
‘We’ll probably never be sure,’ he said.
‘Not here,’ she said. ‘Not with things playing with our heads. We’ll know when we get out of here because we are going to talk about this when we get home. Until then, this mustn’t happen again.’
‘Why would it?’
She looked at him meaningfully. ‘You know why,’ she told him.
‘Magic?’
‘Chemistry,’ she said. ‘Now let’s get back to the camp and don’t let Denny know about this or, injured or not, he’ll rip you apart.’
‘Know about what?’ said Denny
~ Chapter Four ~
The problem with being a goddess is that you never really learn how to work a computer. I mean, why would you need to? That stuff is for mortals.
Hecaté did not even know how to turn the damn thing on, so she tried a trick that Tamar often employed with recalcitrant technology, and which annoyed Denny no end. She looked sternly at it. The computer came on.
She was so surprised that she shot backwards in the wheeled chair and knocked over a hideous oil lamp that Cindy had acquired from somewhere. Denny had joked that it was her childhood night light from the days before electricity, and it was certain that everybody hated it. It was pottery of some kind – like a jug and had horrible gargoyle type faces moulded onto it. So, when it smashed into million pieces, Hecaté ignored it and began her search on the computer without a second thought.
The method she used to search was similar to the way she had turned the thing on. Since she had no idea what she was looking for, o
r how to look for it, she merely asked the computer in a firm voice to show her the last files that Denny had been looking at. After what Hecaté took to be a few seconds thought, the computer responded with a face on the screen, which said. ‘I’m not a magic mirror you know,’
‘Oh sorry,’ said Hecaté without surprise. After all, as far as she knew this was how it was supposed to work. ‘I’m new at this,’
‘Ah well,’ said the computer, no harm done I suppose. Everyone has to start somewhere. Would you like a tutorial?’
‘Er, not really, I’m in a bit of a hurry today.’
The computer sighed. ‘Very well then, the last files, was it? Searching … These files are restricted you know,’ it told her suddenly. ‘He really shouldn’t have downloaded them – he’s always doing that you know,’ it added conspiratorially. ‘Naughty naughty.’
‘Doing what?’ asked Hecaté, not understanding.
‘Hacking the mainframe,’ said the computer severely. Hecaté nodded; at least she understood that bit.
‘I’m not sure I should show you these really,’ continued the computer.
Hecaté considered her options. She could say “please” or she could …
‘If you do not,’ she said. ‘Then I might as well…’ she paused dramatically. ‘Spill a caffeinated beverage onto you. The computer blinked, and the files came up.
Hecaté read them avidly.
‘Oh, no,’ she said eventually. ‘Not them!’
* * *
‘Know about what?’ repeated Denny looking at their shocked and guilty faces. ‘Tamar?’
‘Just that I wandered off,’ she said unable to meet his eyes. ‘Er, we didn’t want to worry you.’
‘Don’t,’ said Denny.
‘What?’
‘Lie to me,’ he said, his eyes blazing, his fists clenched.
Then he seemed to relax suddenly. ‘You really don’t have to,’ he said calmly. ‘I know what happened here.’
‘You’re taking it very well,’ observed Stiles.
Tamar gave him a furious look, but Stiles shrugged.
Faerie Tale Page 3