It was like having the worst migraine in the world.
* * *
The Faerie queen was currently searching for Tamar, just as Tamar had been searching for her and with the same amount of success i.e. none at all.
What this came down to in the final analysis, was a catfight over a man. And the Faerie Queen intended to win it. She had never lost her man before.
Of course, Tamar’s motives may have been a little more heroic, saving the world etc. But for the Queen of the Sidhe, it was all about getting what she wanted. She was petty and proud of it. She was a Faerie after all.
That was where Stiles was going wrong. The noise in his head was not the same as if he could hear the thoughts of people. They were just the janglings of a thousand empty minds. It was all background noise, and he would have done better to ignore it and concentrate on the one pure thought that streamed from every mind he was connected to. Kill, Kill, Kill.
The Queen could sense Tamar’s power, and this, she believed, was the way to her mind, but suddenly she sat up and snapped her eyes open. ‘What?’ she cried. ‘Now she’s gone too?’
* * *
‘Will the others notice we’re gone?’ asked Denny suddenly
‘Oh yes,’ said Tamar. ‘We’re on a little trip, that’s all.’
‘I don’t understand all this.’ moaned Denny. ‘I thought we could go back to the point where we left, and it would be like nothing happened.’
‘That’s right, but until we get back, we’ll be gone … look can I give you some advice?’
‘Okay.’
‘Don’t try to understand it, just enjoy the ride.’
Denny huffed. ‘Enjoy it!’
‘It helps if you think of things just happening one after another. We are here, and this is now.’
~ Chapter Twenty Three ~
Cindy was in her room alone, having just put Jacky to sleep. She pulled her slip over her head and shook her hair out. A long hot bath sounded good. She was standing there completely naked, when her witch senses told her she was being watched.
She froze and looked surreptitiously around the room for something that could be used as a weapon. There was a conspicuous lack of hard or edged items in the room, which leaned toward the fluffy or at least feathery and downy elements of décor. The fact that she was naked was of secondary consideration to Cindy; after all, she had nothing to be ashamed of. Where most women would have grabbed a bathrobe, Cindy eventually lighted on a heavy looking jewellery box and headed towards the window with a determined look on her face.
The intruder, who had been watching her with appreciation for some time, realised that he had been discovered and backed away suddenly forgetting that he was on the third floor. He fell thirty feet with a loud yell and landed in the rose bushes with a scream.
All this noise might have attracted some attention, but there was only Stiles to hear it at the moment, and he had enough noises in his head to be going on with.
The infuriated Cindy lit over the balcony without stopping to think, landed lightly on the grass (still naked), and hauled her “visitor” roughly out of the rose patch.
‘What the hell …?’ then she saw who it was and backed away rapidly. ‘You?’
Finvarra gave her a charming smile. ‘My darling girl,’ he said. ‘It’s been too long.’
Cindy suddenly became horribly aware that she was, in fact, naked. It may have been the way he was looking at her – as if she was a particularly appetising pastry. Unable to manifest without a long chant and certain ingredients, she decided to become invisible instead.
‘I can still see you,’ said Finvarra amusedly. ‘I think it’s only fair to tell you.’
Cindy did not believe him, and her face must have said as much because he added. ‘And you can take that look off your face, I can see you, I exist in both worlds remember?’ * *[Becoming invisible, for a witch at least, is simply a matter of letting yourself drift onto the astral plane where ordinary people cannot see you.]
‘Don’t be silly,’ said Cindy far more bravely than she felt. ‘How could I possibly remember anything about you, I don’t even know you.’
‘Oh yes you do,’ he told her. ‘You’ve just forgotten.’
* * *
Night fell suddenly over the Faerie realm. And I do mean suddenly. It was like a light abruptly going out in a room with no windows. Not a scrap of light was left, not a glimmer. It was eerie.
Denny did not like this development, even though he had excellent night vision this depended on there being at least a little ambient light and there really was none at all.
‘Wait,’ said Tamar. A few seconds later, an overlarge moon popped into the sky like a searchlight coming on. There were no stars, but Denny had a feeling that it was only a matter of time before they too were “switched on”
‘How do you do that?’ he asked her genuinely impressed. ‘How did you know, I mean?’
‘You just have to think – crooked,’ she said dismissively. ‘I’m good at that.’
‘Ain’t that the truth,’ muttered Denny.
‘This place isn’t real,’ she carried on as if he had said nothing, she was used to his acerbic little asides. ‘It’s been cobbled together using ideas of what is real, but it’s not quite right. The moon comes up at night, therefore – voila.’ She indicated the moon in the sky. ‘There’s a moon. The fact that it looks more like a TV spotlight is neither here nor there. At least not to us.’
‘Askphrit did better in the deleted file,’ said Denny. ‘At least it looked real in there.
‘I think I’ve worked out why the Dwarfs hate the Faeries so much,’ said Tamar suddenly.’
‘What? Why?’
‘Look around you,’ said Tamar. ‘It’s fairyland. I mean, how are dwarfs perceived nowadays? Fairy tale creatures, the Faeries did that to them. They created an entire mythology based on this.’ she waved a hand disparagingly. ‘Ugh,’ she added. ‘Hi-ho, indeed,’
‘Not just them,’ said Denny gloomily. ‘The centaurs and fauns and everything too.’
‘So what do we do now – boss?’ he added after a pause.
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘There still isn’t really enough light to see by … maybe …’
‘There!’ shouted Denny suddenly and pointed to a region of the sky that was lighting up in sections to fill in the shape of the Faerie castle.
‘Ah,’ said Tamar, ‘a trap.’
‘Oh definitely,’ agreed Denny. ‘She might as well have just hung a large neon sign in the sky with an arrow pointing towards her.’
‘Yes, it could say, “Don’t Go Near the Castle”.’
They both laughed.
‘Well, said Denny. ‘Since we know it’s a trap …?
‘Yeah, since we know that, if we go now she’ll have us right where we want her. Let’s wait until morning. Let her sweat a bit. Wonder what we’re up to. She’ll be nice and jittery then when we do get there.’
‘She could escape in the dark,’ pointed out Denny.
‘She won’t. She’ll be waiting for us. I know it. This is between me and her now. It’s got to be finished.’
‘What are you going to do? Apart from kill her I mean, I mean how?’
Tamar looked puzzled. ‘How?’ she repeated.
‘Yeah,’ he counted off on his fingers. ‘No magic, no iron, no music …’
‘Maybe I’ll strangle her,’ said Tamar with an enigmatic look.
Denny took this to mean that she had not actually got as far as planning the “how” of this operation. However, he was not too worried. They often worked like this, off the cuff as it were. Sometimes, plans just got in the way. Something usually came up, and no one was better at improvising mayhem than Tamar.
If she had not been an evil megalomaniac, Denny could have felt sorry for the Faerie Queen. She had no idea what was about to happen to her. The fact that Tamar, as yet, had no idea either was a mere detail.
He was completely wrong about th
is as it happened. Tamar did have a plan. She just did not want to tell him, in case it did not work.
They settled down, on a bank of mossy grass under the luminous moon to wait until morning.
* * *
‘Why don’t we go for dinner?’ said Finvarra, hopefully holding out an exquisite dress. Cindy looked at it in distaste.
‘Please?’ he said. ‘We have a lot to talk about.’
‘So talk,’ said Cindy without offering to move.
‘We can bring the boy with us, if that would make you more comfortable,’ he said, ‘although if I had wanted to take him from you, I could have done it before.’
‘Maybe you wouldn’t have wanted me to know it was you,’ she countered weakly. This was, at best, a spurious argument and Cindy knew it, but she was in no mood to make things easy for him.
Finvarra just stared at her, a mute plea in his eyes. Eventually she muttered. ‘Oh all right then,’ and took the dress ungraciously.
‘I want to go to Annabel’s,’ she told him. ‘And you’re paying.’
Finvarra nodded. ‘As you wish,’ he said. ‘Do you want a limousine?’
It took Cindy a few moments to realise that this last was not, in fact, a piece of sarcasm at her expense.
She shook her head. ‘I want to go on that,’ she said pointing mischievously at Denny’s muddy, scratched up motorbike. And was immensely gratified to see the horror materialize on Finvarra’s face.
‘You’ll spoil your pretty dress,’ he said.
‘And ruin my hair,’ agreed Cindy. She was enjoying this. This must be how Denny felt all the time. He seemed to enjoy his “take me or leave me” attitude. As far as Cindy was concerned, she would not be a “trophy date” for this – person. She had no intention of letting him think that just because he was handsome and charming, that she was going to make any effort for him at all. That would seem as if she were – grateful or something. And she was not – not at all. If he wanted a piece of arm candy to show off, he was going to be disappointed. She might have been talked into going along with it, but she was not going to let him have it all his own way.
‘I’ll let you drive,’ she said with the air of one conferring a great favour.
Finvarra did not look as if he greatly appreciated it.
But he bowed graciously. ‘As you wish,’ he said to her complete surprise.
‘Wait a minute,’ she said, and roughly ripped the dress up both seams right up to the thigh. Finvarra’s eyes widened.
‘Can’t sit on a motorbike in a tight skirt,’ she said playfully. ‘Okay, I’m ready.’
Finvarra hesitated.
‘We don’t have to go,’ she said. ‘I don’t care, you can just bugger off if you like. Or you can put up with me as I am,’ she grinned, she was flying now. ‘Take me or leave me,’ she told him.
‘As you are,’ said Finvarra apparently coming to some internal decision. He climbed onto the motorbike and held out a hand courteously to help her on, just as he would have, had it been the proposed limousine.
‘That’s better,’ said Cindy hiding her confusion admirably.
They entered the restaurant with Finvarra holding her arm proudly, just as if she had been properly dressed, and they marched in as if completely oblivious of the stares and muttering of the other patrons.
‘Shabby chic,’ said Cindy blithely in a loud voice. ‘It’s the latest thing.’ She looked like she had been through a hurricane; she had bits of twig in her hair.
She had to admit she was impressed, despite herself, at the way Finvarra dealt with it; he could not have been ready for this. Cindy was vain, everybody knew it, the idea that she would go out in public looking like a tattered urchin with no makeup on and no shoes even (her feet were filthy) was inconceivable. And yet Finvarra handled it with gracious aplomb and treated her like a duchess all evening.
They were at the end of the second course, and he still had not got to the point. Cindy’s curiosity was almost at bursting point, but she was too well drilled in the peculiar etiquette of this sort of situation to point this out. He had invited her; therefore, it was for him to bring up the reason in his own good time. Besides, she had no intention of letting him know that she was curious, or interested even. She was doing him a favour. That was the fiction here, and her pride demanded that she maintain the façade.
‘I expect you’re wondering why I asked you here?’ he said suddenly as the supercilious waiter left with their empty plates and his nose in the air.
‘Well it wasn’t to show me off anyway,’ laughed Cindy glancing at the waiter.
‘You look beautiful,’ he said with apparent sincerity. ‘You always do,’
Despite herself, Cindy’s pulse quickened. This sounded like the beginning of one of those adventures that had been so plentiful in her past. It was an age and a half since she had been wined and dined and flattered like this. She felt better than she had for a long, long time. And after all, why not? He was handsome and charming and almost certainly experienced and no doubt skilled*
* [In Cindy’s experience, experience did not necessarily mean skill. Only if the experience had been backed up with the intelligence to learn by it]
He was certainly good at the compliments, and if he was the enemy, well she was forewarned about that. No doubt she would learn far more from him than he would from her.
Finvarra sighed. ‘Where to begin,’ he said. ‘I have such a lot to tell you.’
‘Begin at the beginning,’ said Cindy. ‘I usually find that’s best.’
‘That was a very long time ago,’ he said. ‘A thousand years.’
‘I’m not that bloody old,’ said Cindy indignantly.
‘I am,’ he said. ‘And you may not be, but nevertheless, our story does begin that far back.’
He leaned across the table and took her hand. ‘You may have a young body my dear, but you have a very old soul.’
He leaned back. ‘I have been searching for you for a thousand years. I’m only sorry that she came back and found you first. It has caused so much trouble.’
‘You will kindly explain what you are talking about,’ said Cindy with the forced politeness of someone hanging on to the last shreds of their patience.
‘I’m sorry if I sound cryptic,’ he sighed again. ‘I was hoping that you would remember. But that, it seems, was too much to hope for.’
‘Remember what?
‘How much I once loved you.’ He leaned in close and held her gaze in a hypnotic stare. ‘And still do,’ he said.
Cindy started to shake.
* * *
Stiles was shaking too. In his case, it was because he was dying for a drink. The voices in his head were driving him mad and he kept setting the furniture on fire by accident.
Learning to use your new super powers was not as easy as Denny had made it look. Of course, Denny had always been laid back about everything, whereas Stiles was pretty tightly wound at the best of times, and now was not the best of times, what with the thoughts of a million Faeries roaming haphazardly through his mind. And, of course, at the time Denny had been singularly unhampered by moral considerations whereas Stiles was worried about hurting people. No wonder it had been easier for him.
Hecaté decided it was time to do something about the situation. She had left him alone in the hope that he would come to her – but it had apparently not occurred to him to seek the advice of the only other deity within his personal circle.
‘And he calls himself a policeman,’ she thought. ‘Hah!’ More importantly, he had not thought to go to his wife and confide in her. But that was mortal men for you – immortal men too if she remembered rightly.
She eschewed the small talk and got straight to the point, a trick learned directly from him. You cannot live with a policeman and not learn a thing or two about interrogation. First rule, you already know whatever it is they are not telling you. Assume that and let them fill in the blanks in an attempt to keep up.
‘You can hear them a
ll can you not?’ she said without preliminaries. ‘In your head. I imagine it is difficult for a human to manage. I am used to it of course.’
Stiles stirred and gave her a good view of his blurred and bloodshot eyes. ‘You?’ he said.’ ‘You can hear …?’
‘Every witch in the world, yes.’
Stiles sat up interestedly. ‘Really? How do you stand it?’
‘It has always been that way,’ she told him. ‘It is part of being a god. But I can help you.’
‘Can you help me shut it off?’
‘Is that what you really want?’
Stiles thought about it. ‘No, not really, but I don’t think I can take much more of it without going insane.’
‘A human mind was never meant to deal with this power,’ mused Hecaté. ‘But then, not all of your mind is human any more. Part of it is the deity now. He’s in there with you, is he not?’
The gauntlet …’ said Stiles vaguely. ‘He runs it from inside my head, only … it’s me too. But it’s him that tells me how.’
‘So he is in there? That is the part of you that can hear the Faeries. Let him deal with it.’
Stiles frowned. ‘It’s that easy?’ he said. ‘Just … let him deal with it. But he’s me. I don’t see …’
‘Just try it. Separate your mind.’
Stiles closed his eyes. After a minute, he smiled and began to snore.
Hecaté smiled. ‘I knew you could do it,’ she said softly and leaned down to kiss his forehead. ‘Sleep well my love, sweet dreams.’
* * *
The morning hit them like a hammer. The sun did not so much rise as shoot up into the sky like a rocket and burst into flame.
‘Bloody hell!’ said Denny but more as a matter of form than anything else, they had been expecting something like this.
Tamar laughed; it had been a long time since he had seen her so happy. It was the prospect of violence ahead. Denny had always deplored this side of her nature, but he had to admit she reined it in most of the time. Only those who deserved it felt her wrath. And no one could argue that Queen Onagh did not deserve it.
He brushed his hair away from his face and rubbed his gritty eyes, he could do with a wash. And, naturally, there was a handy stream nearby.
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