The Dark Beloved

by Helen Falconer

  She lifted the black dress to check her hip – the grazes were gone from there too. Only the mark of a broad, square palm, fingers spread out.

  He had healed her.

  She tugged down her skirt, closed the lid of the toilet seat and sat on it, staring at the back of the door.

  He hadn’t damaged her. He had healed her.

  The chattering second years had finished beautifying themselves. Loud music blasted in as they left the bathroom, then cut off as they let the door slam shut.

  Aoife got to her feet. She had to go to him, to tell him.

  Before she could open the cubicle door, the outer door of the bathroom opened again. Two pairs of feet crossed the floor, followed by the noise of a tap being turned on, and the gasping sound of someone splashing their face with cold water.

  Over the noise of the tap Jessica’s voice was asking, ‘Are you all right?’

  The sound of paper towels being ripped from the holder. Aisling’s voice answered, slightly muffled: ‘Ugh. I feel so ugly. Did you see how beautiful she looked? No wonder Shay didn’t have eyes for anyone else. I hate this stupid outfit!’

  ‘It’s original!’

  ‘If only I was gorgeous like her.’

  ‘Ah now, Aisling, you are!’

  ‘Good joke. I mean, it was like she put a spell on him. He just kept staring and staring at her . . . Why can’t I do that to a boy?’

  Hidden in the cubicle, Aoife couldn’t help smiling – her heart, a small balloon of pleasure coming untied.

  A blast of Britney as the door opened and slammed again. Sinead called cheerfully, ‘Oh my God, did you see what Aisling was wearing? Oh, hi, um . . .’

  Jessica said, ‘Aisling worked really hard on her outfit she didn’t just throw on a black dress and a fascinator same as the rest of us.’

  Without even pausing, Sinead said, ‘Aren’t you great, Aisling, and your costume is fabulous. I can’t believe Shay didn’t fall for you instead of going off with that absolute whore in her fancy white silk dress.’

  Another brief blast of music, and now Lois’s voice was squealing, ‘Shay’s slow-dancing with her now and everyone’s watching them like they’re that one from Dirty Dancing!’

  ‘Who is she, anyway? Did you find out?’ Sinead asked.

  Lois said, ‘Apparently she’s that new waitress from that café up near the Glen. I guess that’s how he knew her – he lives only up the road.’

  Inside the cubicle, Aoife had to stop herself crying out with the agony. Her heart was made of glass, cracks shivering across it; she put her hand to her chest, as if that way she could protect it from falling to pieces.

  Jessica was saying, ‘He’s just gone so impossibly gorgeous since he turned sixteen.’

  ‘And he knows it,’ Sinead said. ‘I blame that Aoife O’Connor. No doubt she was telling him how fabulous he was all summer. Slut.’

  ‘Ah, now!’

  ‘She is a slut and you know it. Did you not see her going after Darragh Clarke?’

  ‘He seemed to be going after her—’

  ‘Bullshit. He’s a boy – he hasn’t got a mind of his own, he goes where he’s led. But I’m not letting her get her hooks into him – she’ll only give him a big head. There’s nothing worse than a boy who knows he’s devastatingly good-looking.’

  Sinking back down onto the toilet seat, Aoife sat with her head in her hands, tears sliding down under her fingers and winding their way around her wrists.

  Another blast of music – Britney had been replaced by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Lorcan’s voice called, ‘Lois, there’s this guy out front says you hired him to give everyone trips around the square in a Halloween coach?’

  A moment of astonishment in the bathroom, before Lois said, ‘Bullshit, and this is the ladies’ – go away and shut the door.’

  The music continued in the background: the door was being held open. ‘He definitely says you hired him as entertainment for the disco. He must be a friend of Paddy Duffy the undertaker, because he has that horse-drawn carriage Paddy uses for the traveller funerals, and he has it all dickied up for Halloween with skulls and stuff.’

  ‘Nothing to do with me.’ Lois was clearly mystified.

  ‘Sure, whatever. I’m only here because he said someone should go and fetch you out to him, because you might like a free spin before he got going with everyone else, but if you’re not interested—’

  ‘No, wait! What does he look like?’

  ‘Tall, very dark red hair?’

  Lois screamed: ‘Oh my God!! Tell him I’ll be right out!!’

  ‘Grand, so . . .’ The music cut off.

  In the bathroom, Lois was still screaming, ‘Oh my God, he came! I can’t believe he came! Quick, give me make-up . . .’

  Sinead was saying urgently, ‘Who came? Who is it?’

  ‘The guy who came to my back door! He’s really interested in me! Oh God, he’s so beautiful . . .’

  ‘The axe-murderer?’

  ‘Ha, ha, in your face, Sinead Ferguson. Lend me your foundation.’

  Sinead snapped, ‘No, it’d be a waste.’

  ‘Give it to me!’

  ‘What’s the point? You’re only going to be chopped up into little pieces and stuffed in a bin bag.’

  ‘GIVE IT TO ME! And that mascara, which is actually mine.’

  Sinead said bad-temperedly, ‘Fine, take it, but I’m telling you the next person doing your foundation will be Paddy Duffy himself.’

  Lois chanted, ‘You’re so jealous! So, so jealous!’

  ‘Lois, he’s turned up to see you in a funeral carriage. Could he make his intentions any clearer?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous! You heard Lorcan – it’s a bit of craic for Halloween. I was telling your man how boring the disco was. It’s so nice of him to say this was my idea! Come on, girls, let’s go! This’ll be fun . . .’

  With much chattering and laughing, the bathroom emptied.

  Just before the door closed, Aoife heard Sinead saying: ‘Make sure to keep your phone on so we can track your body by the GPS.’

  And Lois gloating: ‘Oh, you’re so, so jealous!’

  Silence.

  Aoife took her head from her hands; stood up; let herself out of the cubicle. For a while she stood staring into the mirrors above the sinks. Her mascara was streaked across her cheeks by tears – she pulled off a paper towel, wetted it and scrubbed away the black marks. Her shoulder was visible in the mirror – the mark of his hand. She hesitated, then touched it again; it was still very warm.

  He had healed her body. His parting gift.

  She jerked her cardigan back into position.

  Pride.

  The hall was shaking, the music turned up full, but there were only two people dancing – very slowly, circling the centre of the floor. Shay had his arms around the girl from the café. She had on the white silk dress which she’d been wearing when she got down off the bus; her feet were bare. She was leaning against him, her forehead resting on his shoulder. His eyes were also closed; his curved mouth pressed to the girl’s pale white-blonde hair. Her dress clung and swung around her slender figure – she shone like a ghost in the ultra-violet strobe, a flickering white against his black. The perfect match in every way.

  Don’t cry, Aoife. Pride. Pride.

  Blinking back tears, she took out her phone and texted Carla, who she couldn’t see anywhere:

  got to go sorry c u tmw

  Out on the floor, the girl took Shay’s dark head between her hands and tilted it down towards her. His eyes were still closed. He kissed her, very softly and purposefully, on the lips. No resistance at all. Wasn’t he afraid of destroying her with his love? Clearly, his desire for her outweighed all caution. The girl smiled and drew her fingers down the strong curve of his neck. He groaned softly, as if her light touch had inflicted pain.

  Aoife fled.

  The steps were thronged by excited party-goers. Below in the lane sat Paddy Duffy’s large black coach. On the
box sat a man wearing a hooded cloak, holding a white whip. Between his feet a Halloween pumpkin glowed, and other smaller pumpkins dangled from hooks at each end of the box. The sides of the carriage were decorated with skulls sporting grey tufts of hair. Paddy’s two huge strong carthorses – usually unflappable – were shifting restlessly between the shafts; black ears fearfully flattened, nostrils scarlet.

  Aoife kept to one side, hand shielding her face, hiding tears. The crowd grew thicker, the nearer she got to the bottom of the steps – everyone, including Carla and Killian in his vampire outfit, was queuing. Lois was fighting her way to the front. ‘Let me through! He’s my friend!’

  A man wearing an undertaker’s top hat pulled right down over his face was leaning out of the coach door, yelling in the style of a fairground hustler: ‘Roll up! Roll up! Rides for all! Rides to the underworld! Get your one-way tickets here!’

  From the middle of the crowd Killian yelled out, ‘How much for two tickets?’

  The hustler shouted back, ‘Two for the price of one, because I feel like I know you from somewhere, young man!’ Then dropped his voice a little, and said chirpily, ‘Well, good evening, Father . . .’

  Father Leahy – presumably come down from the priest’s house to check on all the excitement at the parish hall – was standing at the door of the coach, saying loudly in his dull, nasal, sermonizing voice, ‘Young man, you’re on church property. I trust you have insurance for this?’

  ‘All signed and sealed, Father! And I’m expecting no complaints from the church.’

  ‘Your coachman knows how to handle the horses?’

  ‘He was born to it, Father! Do you want first ride? Ah, now, don’t go!’

  The priest had turned away, a cold smile on his face. Aoife – now at the foot of the steps – shrank against the corner as he passed her, climbing the steps towards the hall. He didn’t glance in her direction, but he drew his robes close around him as if suddenly detecting an evil presence. She jumped down the last step and hurried away, up the ill-lit lane towards the square.

  ‘Hey, you there in the cat’s ears!’

  She couldn’t be the only one wearing cat’s ears.

  ‘Hey, Aoife O’Connor! Come for a spin, why don’t ya!’

  This time she froze by the graveyard wall, hairs pricking on the back of her neck.

  ‘Aoife! Ee . . . fah!’

  Now the voice had turned softer, smoother . . . Captivating . . .

  Sick to her stomach with dread, slowly, she turned.

  Leaning in the open doorway of the coach, looking straight at her, the top hat now tilted far back on his head . . .

  Aoife’s knees gave way, and she grabbed the stones of the wall beside her to keep herself on her feet, forcing herself to stay standing until the first icy shock-wave of fear had passed through her. Her body paralysed. Her mind swimming in terrified circles . . .

  Dorocha was beaming. ‘Come hither, young lady, for the trip of a lifetime!’

  Move, Aoife, move, run . . .

  What to do, where to go? Stay strong. Focus. Once before, she had escaped him . . . Yet that was when Shay had his desire for her, protecting her with the grá, his lenanshee love. Shay Foley was lost to her now – dancing in the parish hall, oblivious, his curved mouth buried in another girl’s hair.

  He had abandoned her.

  ‘Hey, hey!’ Lois had finally made it the front of the queue. ‘You said I could have first ride! You promised!’ She tried to clamber up the steps of the coach in her high heels, slipping and sliding, holding out her hand for Dorocha to help her up.

  ‘Ah, Lois! Faithful servant! The first to welcome me down the fairy road and open her doors for me so kindly! Do you want a one-way ticket to the Festival of the Dead?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I do!’

  ‘Then come with me and off we go!’

  To groans of impatience from those who had been waiting longer, he reached for Lois’s hand and pulled the eager girl up the steps and into the interior. ‘Drive on, coachman! We’re off to the Festival of the Dead!’ On the box, the dullahan driver – his orange rotting head between his feet – cracked his white whip. The horses whinnied nervously and tossed their big heads. The grey skulls knocked like knuckles against the woodwork and, with much creaking of brass and leather, the coach rolled slowly forwards – Dorocha leaning at an angle out of the door, gripping the frame with one hand and the brim of his undertaker’s hat with the other. As the horses picked up speed towards where Aoife stood frozen, he flourished the hat, crying gleefully, ‘And now, my queen!’

  Instantly unfreezing, Aoife kicked off her high heels, sprinted down by the graveyard wall and round the corner, across the empty square. She strained for speed, but by the time she’d reached the far corner, the coach had burst from the entrance to lane. Round the pub, up towards the bog, cold rough gravel under her bare feet – had she lost them? – but the rattle of wheels and the drumming of hooves were coming fast behind; horses gasping with the strain, finding it hard going up the hill . . .

  If she could reach the bog before she was caught, if she could cut across the soft heather where the heavy wheels would sink and horses founder . . .

  Closer came the horses.

  She mustn’t let him catch her, mustn’t let him put his hands upon her . . .

  She could hear his voice now, howling over the thunder of wheels: ‘Aoibheal!’ The name her fairy mother had given her. The mother Dorocha had murdered. ‘Aoibheal, come here to me!’

  And Lois’s voice ringing out as well, high-pitched: ‘Who are you calling? Who’s out there?’

  ‘Aoibheal!’

  But the cries and the rumble of the wheels were falling behind. The slope was too steep for two horses dragging the big heavy undertaker’s coach behind them. I’m out-pacing him . . . Twenty metres ahead was one last solitary house – its outside lights whitening the night – and beyond that the darkness of the bog. She was pulling ahead . . . Nearly there.

  Behind, the door of the coach crashed open, and booted feet landed on the road, then came racing after her at terrible speed. Faster, so much faster than the horses. Faster than her. She made a furious, terrified effort to redouble her speed . . .

  Run, Aoife, run.

  Hands of steel grabbed her shoulders, and his fingers were sinking into her flesh.

  She was struggling, kicking, falling.

  Down.

  The strength being sucked out of her. He was drinking her in through his hands . . .

  Down.

  . . . as if his fingers were straws, and she a long, cool drink of blood.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Dorocha said, very slowly and seriously, ‘Look . . . at . . . me.’

  Aoife kept her eyes crushed shut. Don’t look at him. That moment on the altar, when he had thrust her fist into the hole where his heart should have been . . . No heart. She was going to fall into that bottomless pit . . . Eternity. Don’t look into his eyes . . .

  Down.

  This was no handsome, charming man. He was a black hole, full of the ghosts of long-dead stars.

  Un-empty emptiness . . .

  She was being pulled towards him. She was growing weaker. Weaker. Don’t look into his eyes . . . I’m . . .

  Don’t fall.

  ‘Look at me, Aoibheal.’

  Shay, help me. I think he is the devil . . .

  But Shay was dancing, and she was on her own. Darkness began to come and go, flashes of consciousness passing across her mind like strobe lights in a disco . . .

  The girl in white . . .

  He was dancing . . .

  How was it possible that Shay had abandoned her?

  ‘Look at me, Aoibheal.’

  Eternity in his arms . . .

  ‘For the third time. Look at me, Aoibheal.’

  Helplessly, she did.

  Grinning, he winked at her. Then let go of her shoulders and did a full twirl, arms above his head. ‘So, what do you think of my Halloween outfit?’
The outside lights of the last house on the road poured a faint skim of brightness over him. He was still wearing the linen shirt stained with his own blood, and his long black coat and soft red boots. But he had amused himself by adding other mocking details: Paddy Duffy’s undertaker’s hat, which now had real spiders poised around the brim; a necklace of human teeth; a blank human eye, fastened to his lapel with a long silver pin. (Oh God . . . The horror . . . Whose corpse was lying desecrated in Paddy Duffy’s funeral home?) Aoife backed up against the stone wall of the field behind, the brambles sticking into her legs and arms. She clenched her fists, desperate to feel a rush of power – as when the welfare officer had come for Eva, or Killian had threatened Carla.

  Nothing.

  ‘Come, my queen.’ His tone was hushed; a mockery of an undertaker’s voice. He leaned forward to slide his arm round her back. With the other hand he removed her cat’s ears and tossed them into the field behind, saying, ‘Not very regal! We will find you a tiara of sapphires instead, my queen.’

  She tried to say, I don’t want your jewels. But what little strength she had left, his touch was draining from her. Feeling her slump against him, he laughed and gathered her into his arms like an armful of grass, then half supported, half lifted her into the coach.

  Lois was sitting bolt upright in the corner, looking furious. ‘Where did she come from? What are you bringing her on the ride for? I thought this trip was just for you and me!’

  Dorocha said with exaggerated patience, ‘But Lois, this is Aoibheal.’

  ‘No it’s not, she’s Aoife! And you won’t like her, she’s a slut, always after other people’s boyfriends . . .’

  He laid Aoife gently down on the other seat, then leaned out to close the door. ‘Lois, I can assure you – whether I get to like her or not – this is Aoibheal. She may have been going incognito among you, but she is the queen of the underworld.’

  ‘Oh . . . What?’ Lois was confused but hopeful. ‘You mean . . . Is this a Halloween game, like Dungeons and Dragons?’

  ‘That’s right.’ Settling himself next to her, Dorocha gazed fondly into Lois’s round, anxious face; he touched her under her chin, very lightly, with the tip of his long forefinger. ‘It’s all one big game, my lovely Lois.’