Isla's Inheritance

by Cassandra Page

  The next few days dragged.

  I visited Dad at least once a day. Now that I’d removed the iron picture frame from the gym bag, wearing a pair of my aunt’s gardening gloves to shield my hands from the metal and taking slow breaths so I didn’t hurl, he didn’t have any more seizures. But he also didn’t show any signs of recovery. The doctors were baffled: the tests came back saying there were no drugs in his system and no signs of brain injury. He hadn’t even scraped his head when he collapsed in the driveway. As far as they could tell, he was healthy.

  Except no one could wake him.

  The rest of my family were anxious, although they were trying to hide it from me. Aunt Elizabeth had called her mother, our nana, to tell her about Dad’s condition. She was going to fly over from England and stay for Sarah’s birthday. So Aunt Elizabeth was also anxious about getting the house pristine and keeping it that way; given we were no longer attending school, Sarah and I were drafted into helping scour the bathrooms and tidy the garden. She and I would have to share a bedroom while Nana stayed with us. After a brief inspection of each of our rooms, Aunt Elizabeth decided I could bunk in with Sarah, because my room required less work to get cleaned up.

  I was anxious too, but the cause wasn’t ignorance about Dad’s condition. It was concern about what I’d have to do to cure him and whether I’d be up to the task.

  Jack was positive I could do it, but I didn’t share his confidence. I still hadn’t detected any signs of “superpowers” in myself, although how they would manifest I had no idea. Jack had told me he’d contact me if he learned anything, but it hadn’t occurred to me until after he left that I should have asked how. He didn’t have a phone as far as I was aware—and, even if he did, he’d never asked for my number. I kept peering between the blinds to check the park but, although I grew to be quite familiar with the neighbourhood kids, I never saw him there.

  Sarah cajoled me to go out for coffee and muffins with Natalie and Kim. Our friends regaled us with tales from school that, for the most part, made me glad we were excused from the rest of the year. Some of the end-of-school pranks sounded like fun, but I didn’t have the heart for it right then.

  Late the next afternoon, as Sarah and I were leaving the hospital, she took me on a detour via the short-term parking near the emergency ward. Head hanging with the weight of seeing my father so helpless, I barely even registered the change of direction.

  “Afternoon, ladies,” a voice said. I looked up in surprise to see Dominic, leaning against his car. He wore a black collared shirt and jeans, and his hair gleamed golden brown in a ray of afternoon sunlight that found its way through the towering buildings.

  The sight of him made my heart jump in my chest. “Uh. Hi?” I stepped forward and he wrapped warm arms around me, kissing the top of my head. My gloom evaporated with the touch of his lips. “Not that I’m not pleased to see you, but what are you doing here?”

  “I know, right?” Sarah said in a voice dripping with mirth. “What a bizarre coincidence.”

  “Totally,” Dominic agreed.

  I looked between them, a slow smile pulling at the corners of my lips. “So that’s why you volunteered to drive, Sarah. You set this up!”

  “Me? Never!” she said, the lie twinkling in her eyes. “But if I did, Mum’s already fine with you being home late. You know, hypothetically.”

  “Hypothetically,” I agreed, laughing.

  Dominic opened the passenger door for me with a bow and a wink. “Fair lady? Your chariot awaits.”

  I blinked at him, reminded overwhelmingly of Jack, and then shook myself and slid into the seat. “Thanks. What’s that? Shakespeare?”

  He walked around to the driver’s seat. “Tarantino,” he said as he opened the door.

  I had a vague memory of Ryan forcing Sarah and me to sit through a gory action movie. “Oh. Wait, wasn’t the guy who said it a serial killer?”

  He thought about it, starting the car. “Good point. I take it back.”

  I mimed wiping the sweat from my brow. “So, where are we off to?”

  “How does dinner and a movie sound? No serial killers, I promise.”

  “Awesome.” I laughed.

  “I hope you don’t mind me springing this on you.” We pulled out into traffic and turned right.

  “No.” The grin felt goofy but I didn’t stop. “Since what happened with Dad I haven’t had a lot of time off. I mean, I don’t mind visiting him and everything, but…”

  “Sometimes you just need to blow off some steam?”

  “Yeah.” I grimaced.

  “He’d tell you the same thing, you know,” Dominic said, reaching across to squeeze my hand as we pulled up at a set of traffic lights.

  I thought about that as we drove into Civic. I couldn’t shake the conviction my dad was aware of his surroundings—my chest feel heavy with guilt if I didn’t stay with him as much as I could. But I knew Dominic was right. Dad would be horrified at the idea of me spending all of my time at the hospital.

  Dominic took me to a tiny Burmese restaurant for curry. He kept the conversation light, funny stories from his backpacking adventure making me giggle until we earned a dour look from a couple at the adjacent table. Afterwards, we went to see a movie. As promised, there were no serial killers. His woodsy cologne filled my senses when I snuggled into the curve of his arm. I stole popcorn from him whenever he looked away, basking in the blissful feeling of being in a new relationship: a feeling I hadn’t been able to enjoy since the dark cloud of Dad’s illness descended on our lives.

  The kissing was good too.

  Dominic dropped me off after the movie. I was humming as I walked up the driveway, my voice stumbling to a halt when I saw Jack’s signal. It was another small bunch of flowers, left on the doormat. This time two butter-yellow daffodils nestled in among green, leafy stems with tiny white flowers on them. They were tied into a posy with string.

  Dominic was still waiting in his car, watching to make sure I got safely inside. Hiding the posy behind my foot, I turned and waved. He returned the gesture before driving away.

  Once his taillights disappeared I scooped up the flowers. As I’d expected, there was no note. The lack of one confirmed my suspicions about the sender. I tucked the posy into my bag.

  I looked from the front door to the park across the street. The house was quiet; Ryan was at work, Aunt Elizabeth would be in bed, and if Sarah was waiting up for me to see how the date went, she wasn’t in the front room of the house. She probably hadn’t heard me arrive.

  The black pavement made no sound under my sneakers as I crept across the street.

  I found him sitting halfway along the bench, as far as possible from the metal bolting the timber to the concrete frame. He wore the same clothes, which I hardly raised an eyebrow at by now, but had the hood back so his ears weren’t confined. There was no moon and the illumination from the streetlight in front of our house was thin here. Given the park was deserted, there was little chance anyone would see his ears.

  He stood when he saw me, a smile lighting up his eyes. The improvement in his appearance struck me; now that the wrinkles were gone he was, well, cute. I was even getting used to the long ears.

  “I found out who she is,” he told me without preamble, handing me the photo I’d loaned him. I sat on the bench, feeling like a deflated balloon. He sat beside me.

  “Her name is Melpomene,” he began. He pronounced it “Mel-pom-uh-nee”.

  I looked at the photo, at my mother’s serious, unsmiling expression, barely visible in the poor light. “Not Melanie.” It wasn’t a question.

  “No.”

  Another lie of my father’s exposed. Resentment and sadness reared their heads, guilt in their shadow. I was being uncharitable. How could I resent him given his current condition?

  However, I did promise myself that once he was awake I would yell at him. I might even gesticulate wildly.

  “What else?” I braced myself.

  “I confi
rmed she is aosidhe, out of Scotland.”

  “She’s Scottish?” That would explain my father’s choice of name for me.

  “No.” Okay, maybe not. “But the shortest paths to her sidhe realm are in Scotland. The duinesidhe do not have nationalities.”

  “What makes the aosidhe the rulers? Is it inherited, like with human nobility?”

  His smile vanished like a pebble tossed in a lake. “Power by virtue of their race. They are the most powerful, both in the sidhe and the human world. They can draw power from around them and use it to their own ends, or bend the sidhe to their will.”

  “And that’s what makes them the sunlight to your metaphorical flowers?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I haven’t drawn power from the world.”

  “That you know of,” Jack said.

  “So how did … does my mother draw power?”

  “She can siphon emotions to sate herself. And she can manipulate the emotions of others, human and fae alike.”

  I stared at Jack, horrified. “She’s some sort of psychic leech?”

  He nodded.

  Nausea unfurled in my stomach, and not because someone had approached me with iron. My mother was able to manipulate emotions? The idea of invading someone’s mind and making them feel a certain way, a way that went against their true self, left me cold. The idea of draining their emotions was worse. What was left inside a person if you drained their emotions? Would those feelings ever come back?

  “Is—” My voice cracked. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Is my mother evil? Is she a bad person?”

  Jack shrugged. “Those sorts of judgments do not apply to the aosidhe.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They are all the same.” For the first time, resentment crept into his voice. His expression was grim. “Vain, powerful, selfish. Imagine a small child, and then give them power over their fellows. That is what they are like. Some of them have moments of kindness; others are always cruel. But they are all selfish.”

  “You sound like you hate them,” I murmured.

  “Hate is a strong word. But I do not like them.”

  Vain, powerful, selfish. I looked at the photo again, wondering what had enticed such a creature to spend almost a year with a human man, masquerading as his wife. What had enticed her to get pregnant?

  Somehow I doubted it was love. If it were love, she wouldn’t have left the day I was born.

  I sighed, shoulders drooping as I stared at my mother’s cool, indifferent gaze. It was easy to imagine she was looking through time at her unwanted daughter, rather than at the unknown photographer.

  Jack reached across, turning the photo over so I couldn’t see Melpomene’s face. “You are not her. You may share some of her gifts, but you are not her.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just do.” I looked away, and he caught my chin with his finger, turning my head back to face him. “There is a reason I live in this country. It is almost as far away from the aosidhe as one can get. But when I felt your power stir, your chrysalis beginning, I sought you out. I watched you, and what I saw made me want to help you. And not because of your aosidhe power. I was quite comfortable with my wrinkles.” His eyes twinkled.

  Our gazes remained locked for a long moment and then I laughed self-consciously and looked away. “You’re sounding stalkerish again.”

  “Forgive me.” He grinned. “I promise I have not looked in any bedroom windows. Or any other windows.”

  “Good.”

  We sat in silence for a few moments. A breeze stirred the tops of the trees, rustling the leaves, and a car drove along the road behind us, its headlights sweeping past. It was peaceful in the park, a marked contrast to the tumult of my thoughts.

  But if I stayed much longer I’d be missed. I sighed and stood. Jack stood, too. “Thanks for finding out what you could. I’m grateful.”

  “Of course,” he said with a smile, nodding his head.

  “Once Dad is moved out of the ICU I’ll come tell you, so we can organise … doing whatever it is we’re going to do.”

  “I will be waiting.”

  His willingness to help was flattering, but also made me more than a little uncomfortable. I didn’t know how to handle someone being so selfless. I said a hasty farewell and left.

  Walking across the road to our house, I saw the curtains in the window twitch. My pulse skittered. Had Sarah or Aunt Elizabeth seen me in the park, talking to someone? I braced myself for questions as I unlocked the door, but when I peered into the lounge room it was dark. Hamish trotted up to me and snuffled the leg of my jeans, his tail wagging.

  “Hi, boy. I’m glad to see you too.” I ruffled the fur on his head and he followed me towards the bedrooms.

  Sarah poked her head out of her room when I turned my light on. “So, how was it?”

  “The movie? Good.” I threw my bag on the end of my bed. Hamish jumped up and snuffled it with interest. I wondered if he smelt the posy of flowers and hastily picked him up, rubbing his tummy. I didn’t want to have to answer awkward questions; Sarah would recognise the posy as being similar to the mysterious one I’d received previously.

  “What about the rest of the date?” she asked, waggling her eyebrows. “The movie finished ages ago.”

  “That was good too.” I grinned. Hamish wiggled so ecstatically I had to put him down for fear I’d drop him.

  “Tell me everything!”

  “Not likely.”

  But Sarah and I spent a happy half-hour gossiping about the details of my date with Dominic, before I brushed my teeth and changed into my pyjamas. It was nice to pretend I was a regular girl with regular things going on in my life.

  I clung to the happy feeling as I drifted off to sleep, wrapping myself in it like a blanket.

  Chapter Twelve