Sixty-One Nails

by Mike Shevdon

  "Sure, and he would have, but your essence, your lifeblood and your magic would have spilled out, consuming your flesh and returning it to the earth,

  completing the cycle and at the same time, beginning it again."

  "You believe in reincarnation?"

  "Not in the sense of a soul reborn, but in the cycle of nature and magic, yes. All magic is given by the earth as life is given. It is eventually returned to the earth to become again. It is not a belief so much as an expression of the Feyre's existence. We live, we die and others will come after us, it is our nature. "

  "I was only defending myself."

  She continued as if I hadn't spoken. "But that way, nothing comes after. The cycle is broken. It's what was originally thought to be the cause of Fey infertility. The wraithkin were slowly consuming us, one by one, until there was nothing left to come back. They were preventing us from beginning the cycle again."

  "But you said it was selective breeding. Politics, you said."

  "I still believe that, but I am one of the Gifted, a halfbreed, and partly human. There are many of the Feyre who still believe the wraithkin are sucking us dry and that is the reason we cannot breed. They believe that by consuming life in its essence, the wraithkin are eating our future. "

  "Can't you explain it to them? Make them understand?"

  "You're asking me to overturn a hundred millennia of belief with five minutes of science." Her expression said this was unlikely to work.

  "So that leaves me as some kind of ghoulish parasite. "

  "It's not like that. The Feyre believe the world is in balance, that where there is true beauty there must be ugliness, where there is life, there must be death. The wraiths and the shades are our darkness, Rabbit, but they're not parasites, they're Fey."

  "Either way, it doesn't leave me in a very good position, does it? The Untainted are already hunting me and as soon as the rest of them realise what I am, they will be too."

  She laughed bitterly. "They're not going to hunt you. They will avoid you. The wraithkin are what the Feyre frighten their children with. And as for the Untainted, I have no idea what they'll do. As far as they are concerned, you can't exist. That must have been what saved you. She must have been as surprised as I was to find you could summon gallowfyre. I only wish I could have seen the expression on her face. "

  "Would you want to get that close?"

  She was silent. I looked up and for a fleeting second there was something cold behind those grey eyes. She turned away, walking towards the street window, looking down onto the traffic and concealing her expression. I worked my knees then gingerly walked forward towards the brightness of the windows, using the wall to steady me as my joints regained their mobility and joined her at the window, though not too close. At the windows I stopped. "Blackbird, that's it! "

  "What is?"

  "That building, the one with the roof covered in verdigris across the street, that's the building from the vision, the one Kareesh showed me."

  "Why would she show you a vision of Australia House?"

  I looked out at the distinctive green-stained roof of the building opposite.

  "I honestly have no idea."

  Ten

  The building across the road was the one from my vision. It was suddenly sharp and clear in my mind. No wonder I had thought I recognised it. I must have been past it hundreds of times.

  Blackbird stood at the window, looking across the street, but she wasn't focusing on the building. She was lost in thought. Whatever it was she was thinking about, it didn't lighten her mood.

  "Are the visions always like this, so fragmented and disjointed?"

  There was a pause while she returned to herself and then she spoke, looking out over the street rather than at me.

  "The way Kareesh once explained it to me, the future is a warren of paths and junctions. She has shown you the main junctions you might pass through from your present. Which path you take, though, and where you end up is for you to choose."

  I tried to imagine time as passages and tunnels crisscrossing into the future. It didn't help. I glanced at Blackbird, staring stiffly out of the window. "What's wrong?" I asked her.

  "It's nothing." She dismissed my question and continued to watch the traffic, but I could hear the lie in that statement.

  "Does finding out that my Fey ancestor was wraithkin make that much of a difference?"

  She didn't answer my question.

  "Look, I can't help who my ancestors were. If it makes

  you feel better, I just won't summon it again, OK?"

  My words fell into her silence.

  "If there's anything I can do…"

  "You can't."

  It was said in a flat quiet voice, without emotion or warmth. It wasn't a reprimand as much as a statement of cold fact. I turned and looked at the building again, unsure of what to say. I understood that there was a part of her that hurt, the part that showed in her eyes at odd times, like last night and now. I wanted to offer her simple comfort against that hurt but I knew if I faced her now, it would be raw in her eyes and she would turn away. "I'm sorry," I offered. "What for?"

  "I don't know, but if it makes any difference, I am."

  "You're sorry." She laughed without humour.

  "Yes."

  "It's not you that should be sorry."

  "Why?"

  "Because…" She stopped and then sighed. "Because I was going to kill you."

  "You didn't know it was really me."

  "I didn't know at first, but then I realised it was you and I was going to do it anyway."

  I took a deep breath. "Can I ask why?"

  "It's complicated."

  "I don't understand."

  "No, you don't. But a big part of me, a strong part of me, wanted to shove that knife in as far as it would go. I wanted to see your blood pool on the floor and watch you die." Her voice was brittle and she was more of a stranger to me in that moment than at any time since we had met.

  "But you didn't." I kept my voice calm, trying to steady her.

  "I knew it was you and I still wanted to kill you."

  She was trying to explain it to herself, as if her hand had been guided by some external force.

  "The important thing is, you didn't."

  "I was going to."

  "But I'm still here. So it's OK."

  "It's not OK. It'll never be OK."

  And there it was, the dead end I encountered every time I tried to reach out to her. I stood watching the traffic, unable to cross the chasm between us. I was surprised when she spoke.

  "When I was little, we lived in a house in a forest." Her voice lost its edge and softened with memory. I had no idea where this conversation was going but I left her space to think about what she wanted to say and it was a while before she spoke again.

  "The house was deep into the trees. At night, sometimes, I went to sleep with the wind roaring in the canopies around the house. It was elemental, and I loved it." There was another long pause.

  "My mother used to hold me up high and whirl me around and tell me I had wings and that one day I would fly…" Her voice broke and she stopped again. She fished in a pocket, pulling out a rumpled hanky. "She used to leave me with my father for hours sometimes. She would kiss his cheek and tell him she'd be back soon. He would smile and busy himself outside. He loved the forest and would spend hours chopping logs or mending things. I would go up to my room and play, wondering where she went.

  "There was a pitched roof below my window at the back of the house and, one time, I stepped out over the sill and slid down the slates to the soft earth. I sneaked around the house and followed my mother into the forest while my father was occupied. It didn't take long to catch up with her, she was in no hurry. She followed a path though the trees to a clearing.

  "I nearly cried out when I saw what came out of the forest to meet her, but she ran towards it and threw herself into its arms and he picked her up and whirled her around above his head, the wa
y she did for me. It was the first time I saw Gramawl."

  She stiffened, steeling herself against whatever was coming.

  "I never heard my mother and father fight. Then one night I woke to her screaming my name up the stairway, telling me to run and hide." Her voice solidified into ice. "I didn't know what to do. I wanted to go to her, but there were sounds downstairs, strange sounds, screams, crashing, my father yelling – it sounded like they were fighting. I didn't understand."

  I could hear her, steadying herself with long slow breaths.

  "I went to my window and opened it wide. It was a wild night and the wind was tearing leaves from the trees in the dark. Everywhere was moving, swaying in the moonlight and I stood at the window and thought how I would slide down the pitched roof and run and find my mother's friend in the forest and tell him to come and help. But I couldn't. I was scared. It was dark and wild, and I wanted her to come and get me. I wanted her to come and tell me everything was well. "The noises downstairs ceased, quite suddenly, and I backed into the corner of my room and made myself as small as I could. I put my hands over my eyes and peeked through my fingers. I still wanted to see, do you understand? The moonlight came into my room, dancing across the ceiling with the wildness outside. I leaned over to look outside, but the moon wasn't shining in." Her voice had gone quiet and small.

  "I tucked myself back in the corner, just as the door was thrown open, and my instinct shouted in my mind 'I'm not here! I'm too small! You can't see me!' But I was only young and there was no magic in me to answer." She took a long slow breath.

  "The figure in the doorway was darkness. He was outlined in moonlight, but he was just dark. The light in the room swam with the trees outside as he entered the room. He went to the open window and looked out into the night. I could have touched his coat, I was so close. He turned back and went to the mirror hanging over the dresser, my faerie mirror, the one my mother had bought for me because it had tiny winged figures carved into the frame all around it. He placed his hand on it and the light from his hand entered it, turning it milky and then clear as the moonlight shone through it." She glanced sideways at me, then looked back resolutely at the road.

  "He said, 'They're dead, but the girl has run off into the forest.' For a moment I thought he was talking to me and I nearly said, 'No, I'm here,' but then a voice came from the mirror, distorted and slowed down. "It said 'Find her.' That's all. Just two words: 'Find her.' It sounded so cold, so angry.

  "The figure took his hand from the mirror and the light within it faded. He turned back to the window facing me, but there was no face, just blackness. The light swelled until a nimbus formed around him and I was sure he couldn't fail to see me squeezed into the corner. Then he took a step towards me and vanished. "The room went dark, but it was a normal dark, a welcome dark. I stayed there, curled into the corner, too terrified to close my eyes in case he came back. The wind died down and the room faded into grey and I stayed pressed into the corner, sure the figure of darkness was waiting for me to give myself away. "As the light grew steadier, there was a noise on the stairs, a creak as something heavy shifted. Gramawl, my mother's friend, unfolded from my doorway and filled my room. He didn't make a sound, but he opened his arms and I uncurled myself and ran to him, burying myself in his embrace." She blew her nose noisily.

  "There was no point in looking for her. The Feyre stand between life and power, holding the two in equilibrium, but when they die there's nothing to hold the power back. The magic consumes their flesh and bones in a last flare of power. We buried my father in the forest, Gramawl and I. It was the only thing to do. He loved the trees."

  She tucked the hanky back into her pocket and straightened her coat.

  "Afterwards, I went back up to my room and smashed the mirror. I couldn't bear the thought of his hand on it, calling the moonlight. Then Gramawl took me to Kareesh and she took me in, just like that. She didn't dwell on what had happened, and I grew up in the forest with her and Gramawl as foster-parents, though she is more like a grandmother to me. She told me what I was and who I was and taught me about the Feyre. They were both there for me when no one else was."

  She pushed her hair back from her face, sniffed.

  "When I was older, I asked her about that night and about what had happened. I asked her why the wraithkin hadn't seen me, though I must have been plainly visible. She told me she would tell me when I came into my power and that then I would understand. So I waited.

  "And when the time came, she taught me what power was and how to wield it, tutoring me in the subtleties and nuances of it. She showed me what it means to be Fey. I thought she would tell me about that night, when I had learned enough, but she never raised it. She let me take my time until I was ready to ask again. "

  "When I finally did, she explained it to me." She turned to face me, finally, her eyes red-rimmed, skin puffy and blotchy. "You remember when I sent you to the moors with the wolves? That's one of the gifts I inherited from my mother. That's what my mother did to the wraithkin, but she couldn't bind him to it. Without his name, he could shrug it off any time he wanted to. So she made a world for him identical to the one he was in, except I wasn't in it. He couldn't see me because, for him, I wasn't there. "

  "She saved you," I said quietly.

  "She saved me, but to do it she had to touch…" The tears welled in her eyes again and she fumbled for the hanky. "She had to put her hand on that blackness, defenceless against what he could do. He consumed her power, sucked the life out of her and discarded her, and she stood there and deceived him while he did it so that I…" The tears ran down her cheeks unheeded, the hanky wrung between her hands. "So I…" Her shoulder shook and she turned her back to me. I stepped forward to offer some comfort.

  "Don't!" She threw her hand back, warding me off.

  "Don't touch me."

  "I'm sorry, I didn't think–"

  "You can't help it. It's what you are."

  Her shoulders shook.

  "I can't change what I am."

  "I know. But that's why I wanted to kill you. Part of me still wants to." She stood apart and I watched her cry.

  Sometimes Alex hates me. She rails against me and screams and shouts and stamps about as if she can't contain the fury within her. Then she cries and screams again and I try and stay calm and soothe her. And when her anger is spent, she won't let me touch her, won't let me hold her. So I wait. And when the storm has finally blown itself out and she's calm again, I open my arms and she'll come and press her head against my chest and accept comfort from me.

  I waited until Blackbird had calmed herself and then

  I opened my arms in that way to her, knowing that, being Fey, touch had other connotations to her than to my daughter but wanting to offer her that simple gesture against her pain. Her grief was wrapped about her like a veil and it was beyond me not to offer some comfort. She hesitated at this human gesture and I thought she would turn away from me again.

  Instead, she shook her head. "No, I'm all right, really. It's just that I've never told anyone that before. Kareesh and Gramawl knew but I've never told anyone else. Only with you being…" She dried up.

  "Yes." I dropped my hands back to my sides, awkwardly. At least I knew why she pulled away. She blew her nose on the dishevelled hanky and stuffed it back into her pocket, looking up at me. "So now what?" she lifted her chin, making a bold effort to put the weight of the past aside. Eyes still puffy, she was determined to move on, rather than dwell on what had been.

  "I don't know. I was hoping you'd be able to tell me. "

  "The building over the way, there. You said it was the one in your vision. What about it?"

  "I don't know. It was mixed up with a whole load of other stuff. I just know it's the one. In the vision there was a sign by the main door carved into the stone, that's all. "

  "What does it say? "

  "I don't know. I couldn't see it clearly. "

  "We should go and look then. "

  "A
re you sure you're up to this?"

  "I'm fine." She broke into a half smile. "I thought I was over it, it was all such a long time ago, but when you summoned the gallowfyre… it brought it all back. I know it's wrong to blame you, but… "

  "You still do."

  "I don't blame you. I don't. It just feels like I should. "

  "Because of what I am?" I rubbed at where the point of the knife had pressed under my chin, feeling the break in the skin.

  "The rational part of me knows you aren't him and could never have been him. It's just my feelings haven't caught up with the rest of me yet.

  "I understand. Sort of."

  "We should go and have a look at this building of yours. Maybe the writing on the doorway will tell us something."

  I accepted her change of subject and she turned away from the window, straightening her coat, and took the stairway down to ground level. I tagged along, down and through the darkening passage to the heavy street door. Blackbird turned the catch, shot back the bolt and opened the door, spilling daylight into the corridor. We stepped out onto the pavement along the Strand, attracting only mildly curious stares from passers-by. Blackbird let me past and then stood at door, masking what she was doing with her body. It made a low crunk sound and when she tested it again, it was locked. I stepped across the wide pavement and turned to look at where we had emerged. A sign along the base of the arched window above the street declared it to be the Strand Station of the Piccadilly Railway. "I've never heard of a Strand Station," I told her. "In fact, I didn't know there was a tube station here at all. "