Carla spent a long afternoon with the Munnellys, trying to persuade them to call her if they sighted any strange people coming over the field behind their house – as Lois’s boyfriend had done last October.
(‘If I see that lunatic,’ Peter Munnelly had said bitterly, ‘the first person I’m going to talk to is himself, to find out when he plans to pay for my new sun room.’
‘And if he knows where our Lois is,’ added Jane Munnelly sadly.
‘Yes, yes, and if he knows where our daughter is …’
Carla soldiered on: ‘You probably think that whole thing about the sluagh is a joke, but actually it’s true. My iron circle did stop them – and your house was the first place saved, because it’s built across the fairy road. Did you see that Lois posted about the sluagh on Twitter?’
Jane Munnelly stared, wide-eyed, but Peter Munnelly laughed rudely: ‘If any fairy tries its tricks on me, I’ll wring its neck!’
Carla cried, ‘No, don’t go near them! These are dangerous fairies. Just call me if you see anything, and Father Leahy will get everyone into the church. Only don’t tell him I told you that, because of the bishop.’
‘Peter,’ said Jane, ‘let’s just tell her we will.’
Peter had laughed even louder: ‘OK, grand – if I see anything strange, I’ll call the guards.’
Carla cried, ‘No, no! This is way too dangerous for the guards! Just call me, please!’
‘Oh, right – too dangerous for the guards, but not too dangerous for a teenage girl?’
Yet in the end she felt that she’d convinced them – or convinced Jane, at least.)
Carla felt a touch on her arm. Her mother had come up to the balcony; she had tears in her dark brown eyes. ‘I’m so sorry I didn’t believe you about the fairies – I’m such a bad mother.’
Carla hugged her. ‘It’s OK, Mam. To be honest, I’d have thought you’d lost your mind if you did believe me. I saw you strangle a grogoch! Good for you!’
Dianne smiled through her tears. ‘And now my other daughter hates me, because apparently it’s wrong to hurt animals.’
‘Don’t worry, Mam, I’ll explain the difference to her later.’
‘Are we going to be all right, Carla? Are these dullahans anything like those awful orange things? Eithne Doherty’s been phoning and phoning the guards but they keep not answering.’
‘Probably just as well. I don’t think the guards would be able to cope. And I’m hoping we won’t get to find out what they’re like close up. Oh God, here they come …’ The druids were already entering the square – men and women in white robes, pushing their tree, ringing their bells and playing their harps.
Turning to look, Dianne’s face cleared and she blurted out a nervous laugh: ‘New Age travellers?’
‘Druids.’
‘Hippies?’
Relieved laughter was also spreading through the church below as the druids peered in through the bars of the double gates, and shook them, and looked puzzled when they were locked. A crowd of taller women appeared behind, wearing old-fashioned red shawls and carrying babies and dragging toddlers by their hands. The druids moved aside to let these women through, but the banshees flinched from the horseshoe-covered walls, and cast dark, flashing eyes towards the windows of the church.
Most of the watching crowd – apart from Eva who shrieked and cowered in Maeve’s arms – laughed even louder, with relief and giddiness. New Age hippies! Traveller women with babies! Everyone was relaxing, even those who had squeezed themselves under the pews – and who were now joining their braver friends at the windows. Joseph Doherty, brushing himself down, was announcing to his wife and anyone else who would listen: ‘Well, that explains it! It’s a travelling circus, and the monkeys escaped. If someone would open these doors, I’ll go out and give them a piece of my mind …’
Behind Carla, Dianne murmured, ‘Monkeys?’ – attracted, despite her apology, by such a wonderfully logical explanation.
Carla, her eyes fixed on the church gates, would have given anything for Killian’s father to be right – even if it meant that she herself had gone completely mad. For a brief moment she even allowed herself to imagine that everything she knew to be true had been a stupid hallucination, and this was all about circuses and escaped orang-utans. The druids – bored – were walking through the marquee, sampling the trays of canapés (much to Grainne’s incoherent fury: she was trying to climb out of a window to get at them, and was being held back by John Joe). The ‘traveller women’ were wandering the perimeter of the square, knocking on doors, on the hunt for more human babies – although there was no one at home to let them in. Joseph Doherty was banging at the glass doors, demanding loudly who had the key …
But then, below in the church, the relieved laughter (and Grainne’s cries of rage) faded to a few chuckles …
Dullahans had appeared at the gates. Monstrous men, well over normal height, each with its head cradled in one arm and a human spine slung over its shoulder – all standing in gloomy silence, gazing in.
Still some tittering continued at the sight of priests bearing Jack-o’-lanterns …
And then the black hoods fell back, and clouds of flies rose from the red, raw stumps of necks. And in the church, the remaining laughter turned off like a tap, replaced moments later by a wave of screaming, weeping, praying: parents clutching their children; old people falling to their knees; even John Joe’s drinking buddies howling with terror. Zoe shrieked against her father’s chest. James and Maeve cuddled a hysterical Eva between them, covering her ears with their hands. At the windows, Shay and Aoife stood with their arms round each other, as if – if this was death – they were determined to go down fighting together.
The first headless monster placed its hand on the church gate …
(‘God help us!’ shrieked Dianne, clinging to Carla from behind.
‘Please God, let the circle hold,’ prayed Carla, clinging to the balcony railing. ‘Please God, let the circle hold.’)
… and the demon’s black glove burst into silver flame …
(‘Oh yes!!’ exulted Carla.)
… and immediately the monster fell back, and the other dullahans gathered around him in a tight circle – inspecting the burning glove, which was now lying on the ground containing a melting hand, while its angry owner nursed a black, spurting stump of wrist.
In the church, the screams died down. The bravest peered out again; the rest knelt, praying. Teresa – too arthritic to kneel – huddled in a pew, her hands over her ears.
The druids, sipping glasses of champagne, came to the entrance of the marquee, as if intrigued to see what would happen next. Even the banshees seemed interested, stepping up on benches around the square, hoisting their babies onto their hips. Now the dullahans were turning their rotting heads towards the church; raising them high in both hands; the dread mouths – shining with fungus – slowly opening, dribbling out long, pale earthworms like drool …
‘John McCarthy!’ shrieked Carla. ‘Deafen us!’
… as a tidal wave of names began pouring from those rotting lips: ‘Zoe Heff—’ ‘Eva O’—’ ‘Joseph Dohe—’ ‘Darragh Cl—’
Ding, dong.
Ding, dong.
Old John McCarthy – who had been waiting for Carla’s signal – was swinging like a lunatic on the rope at the foot of the bell tower, drowning out the dullahans’ cries.
Ding, dong.
Ding, dong.
(From A Most Comprehensive Catalogue of Ye Irish Fairies:
BELL: The bell of God deafens ye against the dullahan’s voice.)
In the balcony, Mrs McClasky – startled into action by the sound of the bell – pulled out all the stops and played even louder, creating an even more brutal barrier of sound: Dah-de, de-dah! Dah-de, de-dah!
Ding, dong.
Ding, dong.
It was only a temporary respite. Enraged not to have their voices heard, the circle of dullahans rippled outwards. Moments later, they ha
d the church surrounded and then – in one movement – rushed the graveyard wall, leaping into the air, spinning, their black robes swirling around their massive bodies.
(‘Save us!’ prayed Carla as her mother wailed.)
And from the gold and silver walls spurted a solid metallic sheet of fire, and the dullahans’ robes went up in flames and their heads tumbled from their hands like putrid fruit, and the raw stumps of their necks caught like the wicks of candles, and the flies scattered in glittering clouds – delicate wings blazing – before sprinkling in their millions across the graves like brittle black drops of rain.
‘Go, silver!! Go, gold!!’ screamed Carla, punching the air.
She wasn’t the only one to be whooping in joy.
The O’Connors were celebrating in each other’s arms.
Aoife and Shay were kissing.
Her father was hugging and kissing both Zoe and her grandmother.
And John Joe’s pub friends were shouting the loudest and shaking their fists manfully, to make up for having made such frightened fools of themselves in front of all those beautiful girls in their long, white lacy dresses.
Not that the lenanshees noticed; they were too busy working on replacing the stained-glass windows with screens of tumbling, colourful wild flowers, and straightening bent candlesticks and buckets with their extraordinarily strong hands. And very gently fixing the hair, make-up and clothes of the stunned, disordered wedding guests who slumped around gasping in the pews.
Carla’s phone – sound turned off for the wedding – vibrated. She took it from her pocket.
Peter Munnelly.
A bit bloody late to be calling now. She’d actually been impressed when the Munnellys hadn’t turned up for the wedding – she’d assumed they had stayed behind on watch. So why hadn’t Peter called her as soon as he spotted the demon horde coming down the field?
Gently pulling away from her hysterical mother, she walked to the back of the balcony, as far as she could get from the organ music, and took the call, saying as unsarcastically as she could, ‘Hello, Peter. You’ll be pleased to know we’re all doing fine here in the church – spectacular actually, because the circle is holding.’
‘Hello?’
Carla nearly fainted – such a rush of delight overcame her. ‘Killian? Oh, thank God. Where are you?’
‘Carla?’
The bell was still ringing, and organ playing. Carla pressed the phone tighter to her ear, shielding the mic with her hand. ‘Yes, it’s me. I’m sorry it’s so noisy here, it’s to stop the dullahans … Can you hear me now? Are you with Peter Munnelly?’
Killian’s voice said faintly, ‘He lent me his phone. He said you were the best person around here to call for help – that you had told him what was coming. He even said he should have paid more attention to you!’
‘Carla?’ Her mother was beside her again. ‘I’m so sorry for going to pieces just now. What do you want me to do to help?’
‘You could ask Mrs McClasky to stop playing – thanks, Mam, I’ll talk to you in a minute.’ Carla turned away from her mother, back to the phone. ‘You and the Munnellys need to get away to somewhere safe, maybe head for Clonbarra.’
‘I’m not with them any more. Help me.’
Her heart turned over. ‘Killian, where are you?’
‘It’s very dangerous out here, Carla. I got caught up in this whole thing, dragged along, I’m quite sick, I feel hollow, weak … I’m not myself.’
‘Killian, are you in Kilduff?’
‘The druids brought me with them in some beaten-up old coach.’
‘You’re a prisoner?’
‘But they’re busy now and I think I can get away.’
‘Wait …’ Taking a deep, steadying breath, she turned to check the lie of the land out in the square. The few remaining dullahans were busy outside the church gates, digging deep pits in the tarmac to bury their fallen comrades. The druids had moved back into Grainne’s wedding marquee, breaking open more bottles of champagne and making a start on the cake. At the other side of the square, the banshees had given up knocking on doors and were smashing their way into the empty houses – Carla could see them at bedroom windows, laying their babies for safety in other people’s beds, then re-emerging through the broken front doors with their crimson cloaks flung back over their shoulders – clearly planning to take over where the dullahans had failed.
Far down the lane that led to the parish hall, she could see the top half of something that looked like a black funeral coach.
The phone cried, ‘Carla?’
‘Sorry, Killian, I’m back. Listen, is that you in the church lane?’
A pause as he checked his surroundings. ‘I’m by a gate.’
‘And is the lane empty? Are you by yourself?’
‘Yes. Yes. And I’m so scared.’
‘Then climb over the gate and run as fast as you can through the graveyard, and by the time you get to the church, I’ll have the vestry door open for you.’
‘I don’t think I can climb or run, Carla. I’m very weak.’
Carla’s pulse raced. ‘OK, then wait there and I’ll come out to the gate to help you in, but we’ll have to be very quick.’
‘Thank you, Carla, I owe you.’
Carla said, feeling like she was tearing out her heart and offering it to him, still beating, on a platter: ‘I love you, Killian.’
A moment’s pause on the other end of the phone. Then: ‘I love you too.’
Beaming, she rushed across the balcony – ‘Back in a minute, Mam!’ – leaped down the stairs and elbowed her way through the crowd towards the top of the church, grabbing a couple of silver candlesticks to bring with her.
Aoife caught up with her in the passage to the vestry, bubbling with delight: ‘Shay told me everything – you’re completely brilliant – I’m so sorry, I should have known you’d have thought of everything, you’re absolutely incredible and heroic and magical …’
Carla felt her cheeks going hot with pleasure – it was so lovely (although ridiculous) to be praised for being heroic and magical by the daughter of an ancient hero and a fairy queen. ‘Thanks, but we’re not out of the woods yet. I think the banshees are planning something, although the iron circle is solid – no gaps at all – so I think we’ll be OK in the church. There might be a siege, but we’ve plenty of supplies. Could you go and keep everyone calm, while I just go and do a little job?’
‘Job?’
For a moment Carla nearly told her. Then changed her mind. If Aoife knew Killian was out there, she would insist on going to get him herself, and then if anything went wrong, the church would have lost its most valuable fighter. ‘I just want to put these candlesticks across the back door of the vestry, for extra safety. Go and talk to the lenanshees and see if they can offer anything more useful than fixing everything with those bloody flowers?’
Aoife – still giddy – ran off, saluting, ‘Aye aye, Captain.’
Carla laughed: ‘Thanks, Fairy Queen!’
The small, windowless vestry was a foul mess. Dead grogoch littered the floor, heads crushed, fur blackened; some seem to have died horribly of asphyxiation, bodies contorted and beady eyes popping out of their heads. The place stank of smoke. And also food, because most of the tins that John McCarthy had supplied (on sale or return) in case of a long siege had been ripped open – tuna, sardines, baked beans, suet pudding.
Ugh. She’d worry about that later.
Slamming and locking the inner door, she jammed the tall silver candlesticks across it, then turned her attention to the outer door.
Disaster.
A heavy mahogany sideboard was in the way – someone had decided that just locking the door against the grogoch wasn’t enough. Carla shoved hard at one end of the huge, solid piece of furniture. Nothing. She leaned her shoulder against it, straining, veins bulging in her temples. The sideboard barely shifted. ‘Oh, come on!’ Panting, she crouched and threw open its doors, sweeping out piles of old
Bibles.
Her phone vibrated. Peter Munnelly’s ID.
‘Killian? I’m coming!’
‘I’m waiting. I love you.’
‘I love you too.’ Leaping up, she pushed again at the sideboard, thrusting with all her strength. Her brains might be candyfloss, but her determination to save Killian was strong as steel. This time the monstrosity moved, sliding slowly across the carpet until there was just room enough for her to get to the door. She opened it just as a grogoch scuttled past and headed round the corner of the church.
Carla froze. Waited. Thank God poor Killian hadn’t taken her stupid advice to run across the graveyard by himself …
The grogoch didn’t return, and no others followed. Hopefully it was just a straggler.
Quickly she stepped out and closed the door behind her (leaving it unlocked, but only for a moment) then ran – head down, zigzagging between the graves. A black coach stood at the narrow gate – roof caved in, door smashed, the wheels at dangerous angles. No one was on the driver’s seat up top but, as she neared the gate, she could see Killian’s slender frame slumped within, his arm along the back of the seat, his head resting sideways on his arm. A way of sitting she would know anywhere.
She leaned over the gate, whispering, ‘Killian!’
His shadowy face turned slightly, and the autumn daylight fell across his nearest cheek.
‘Don’t get out yet.’ Carla checked up the lane to her right. At the corner, by the square, were the banshees; they were moving down the lane, three abreast, slowly – looking for a break in the horseshoes. She’d better be quick, getting Killian out of the coach and over the iron gate. She checked the other way – and gripped the gate, feeling sick. Between the shafts of the coach were the skeletons of two huge horses, heads lowered; ghostly breath steaming from bony nostrils.
The Hawthorn Crown Page 29