Gunshots. Blood. Gone. I shook away the memories like shaking stray autumn leaves from my hair before they could squeeze my heart too tight.
I remembered the story as Aoife led me through the village built of sloping shops. Some held flopped-over menus and crackled pies behind their dusty windows, and others, weary-faced dolls, fiddles and banjos, un-ticking clocks, and oriental lampshades. Rusty pickup trucks were parked on the edges of the street, and telephone lines crisscrossed overhead.
Few people were out and about, but those who were walked with their heads down and their sunhats fixed over their eyes. As we ventured out of the thick of the village, farmhouses with boarded windows and loose nails popped up like buttercups, and soon, the woods grew thick again. It wasn’t until we climbed the tallest hill at what must have been the very end of Starlight Valley that we came upon the mansion.
The mansion reminded me vaguely of something Mrs. Flanagan taught in a history lesson: the magnificent structures the Greeks built—the Parthenon, or the Pantheon, or whatever it was called. This was built of white marble, tall columns stretching three floors up, a balcony splitting the first and second floors. A stone path led through the garden to two stairwells circling a large door. Wisteria climbed the columns, and willows and cherry trees, pink with blossoms, tucked the palace in like sheets around a child. Pretty hydrangea bushes spotted the grounds, their flowers soft and hazy as a cloud of perfume, or perhaps the northern lights. The place could have been made of watercolors and dreams for all I could tell.
“Welcome home,” said Aoife. “I trust you’ll find it comfortable, Finn.”
“This is all yours?” I gritted my teeth the minute I said it; how positively unsophisticated of me.
Aoife seemed unfazed, though. She squeezed my shoulders again, close to her chest and said fiercely, “You’ll love it here.” I could have sworn I saw fire in her eyes.
As we climbed the steps to the grand door, she added, “You shall have anything you wish for under this roof. Anything you desire will be yours. You will never shed another tear. Won’t that be divine?”
By this point, I wasn’t quite sure whether to say, “Yes,” or “I’m only staying for a few weeks, though—right?” or “May I use the loo, please?” because the queasiness from the ride over still hadn’t subsided. So, instead I said, “Probably,” and cringed again at how rude the word sounded.
Aoife cast a thin-lipped smile down at me as she twisted the doorknob—gold and shaped like a bird—a swan, I realized.
The door swung open.
Warmth.
Lights.
Happiness. Pure as sugar, it lasted but a moment before my eyes adjusted to the brightness of the mansion’s foyer.
And then feathers. And then swan heads. And then horror.
Chapter 20
THE WALLS WERE WHITE. The walls were not painted white. The walls were papered in feathers. Feathers so pure they could have been sewn of starlight. Stuffed swan heads lined the walls in rows like streetlamps, glassy eyes staring down at Aoife and me.
Tall marble pillars rose from the black-and-white-checkered marble floor and a chandelier hung from the ceiling with real candles alight. The candleholders were carved of gold in the shape of swan heads with very long necks, beaks spread open to keep the candles in place and swallow the wax.
At the end of the foyer, a swirly stairwell rose up to a second floor, railings made of the same gold as the chandelier. A grand piano stood in the corner, though I could see even from the door that a layer of dust coated the keys.
There was a certain smell about the place that I couldn’t quite put my finger on—a creeping, crawling scent sticking to my skin like clay does after digging for it from the earth with your bare hands. The kind of scent that wouldn’t wash off with water.
Aoife twirled around, feather coat flying. “What do you think, my love?”
What did I think? I thought nothing. I simply felt. What did I feel? I felt as if I were stumbling through a dream. First, because of the mother I hadn’t known existed dancing before my very eyes; like a faery goddess, she felt only half real. The sort of mystery that exists only in dreamlands. She was a beautiful, frightening thing. And then, the house, like a castle for the dead. Rich in splendor, a pauper in comfort, it sent my spine shivering. It made me angry, it made me sad, it made me lonely, it made me exhilarated, it made me happy. I tasted lemon drops.
I shook my head, pretending I had only just realized Aoife’s question. “I … it’s … feathered—I mean festered—I mean festive—”
Aoife tossed back her head, and a prettier laugh there could not be heard. It echoed around the foyer like wind chimes in a cavern as Aoife’s golden curls caught the light of the chandelier and slipped off her shoulder. “It catches your tongue, doesn’t it?” she said. “Snatches your breath right out of your lungs.” Aoife held up a hand and two black smudges fluttered down from the ceiling and landed on her forearm. “This is Bronwyn and Blagden,” she explained. The two crows stared beadily into my eyes. “Our little pets.”
Aoife led me to the stairwell, but as I was about to take the first step, she stopped me with a heavily jeweled hand—though she wore nothing on her wedding ring finger.
“Now,” she said, stooping down to look me in the eye, “would you like to meet your sister?”
I froze. Da hadn’t mentioned anything about sisters. Sister. The word beat warm in my chest. Any fear I had felt before melted away.
Aoife smiled coyly, her lips a deep, deep red. “Priscilla-Kathryn!” she called up the stairwell.
Such a strange name, I thought, as above us, a door slammed open. And then came footsteps, skipping down the stairs.
The girl’s eyes, despite their effort, could not hide their shining blue behind her strawberry-blond hair. She wore a periwinkle sweater with rose-shaped buttons atop a daisy-print dress. She also wore spotless white tights instead of sporting scraped knees, and her feet were half the size of mine. Her eyebrows were raised and her lips pressed taut in annoyance as if her mother had just interrupted her from discovering a cure for polio. She picked at her pink nail polish and she did not smile. When she looked up, she did not frown, but gazed intently at me, pretty and afraid.
Aoife swept over to the banister and hurried the girl down. “Priscilla-Kathryn, meet your sister.”
She stared at me.
I stared at her.
And then she smirked. “Not by blood.” Her voice, unlike her mother’s, was most certainly, irrefutably American. Vowels spread long and thin like ice cream melting on a sidewalk. “And they call me Posy-Kate.”
“She just had a birthday—turned eleven two weeks ago,” said Aoife.
“No,” said Posy-Kate, “I turned eleven in February—”
Aoife’s eyes glowed angrily, but she plastered on a smile. Once more, she turned to Posy-Kate. “Well, August is when we celebrate it.”
This made little sense to me, but I decided it safest to let the question slip. Instead, I said, “You’re—”
“Adopted, yes,” said Posy-Kate.
“Oh.” I blushed. “I was going to say ‘pretty.’”
“That reminds me,” said Aoife to me, “you recently had a birthday, did you not?”
I nodded vaguely. My birthday felt so far away, though I knew it had been only a couple days before.
Aoife pulled something from inside her feather cloak—a box, tiny and wrapped in gold paper. Posy-Kate’s eyes fixated on the box, mouth pressed into a dour frown. Aoife handed the box to me. I peeled off the box’s tape, ripped off the gold paper, and lifted the lid.
Inside, a necklace sat atop a cloud of cotton. I picked it up, laid it flat in my palm, and let the soft metal snake through my fingers.
“It’s a swan feather—real—encased in silver. You’ll find I’m rather fascinated by swans.”
I wanted to ask Aoife why—why was she so fascinated by swans? Did she know the story of the Children of Lir? Had Nuala told the stor
y to her? Was Aoife the reason Nuala told the story to me? But I didn’t want to press my luck, either. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing. I didn’t want to annoy my mother. I’d just gotten her, after all. No, I wouldn’t lose her too. Not like Nuala, not like Darcy, not even like Da.
I laid the necklace back in its box and said, “It’s lovely, thank you.”
Aoife smiled. “I do hope you enjoy it.”
Posy-Kate brushed in front of Aoife and demanded, “Well, are you gonna tell me your name or not?”
“Manners,” snapped Aoife.
I inched back from Posy-Kate. “Finn.” My voice wavered.
“‘Fin’?” piped Posy-Kate, crossing her arms over her chest. “Like a fish’s?”
“No,” I said, and then I coughed and added, “No, I mean … yes. Similar to a fish fin. Like a merrow’s.” A merrow was a magical, mistral faery that lived beneath the sea, half human, half fish. I wasn’t really like a merrow, but I thought I might like to be, at least more than I wanted to be a fish.
Posy-Kate, though, thought otherwise. She flicked at the yellowed lace on my collar, a few breadcrumbs falling to the marble floor. She tut-tutted and scoffed, “If you ask me, I think you’re a fish out of water—”
“Priscilla-Kathryn—” shot Aoife, but to my own surprise, I cut her off.
“Perhaps a swan, then?” I said.
Three sets of lungs stood still.
Posy-Kate slowly stuck out a hand for me to shake and said silkily, “Why yes. It’s a pleasure—Finbird.” She smiled slyly on the word.
I did not take her hand. “Excuse me?” I breathed.
“Finbird,” she repeated, withdrawing her arm. “That’s what I’ll call you. It’ll be our little nickname. Suits you, don’t it?”
There were a thousand things I could have told Posy-Kate—that Finn was already a nickname and that nicknames don’t get nicknames and that even if nicknames did get nicknames, you don’t make a nickname’s nickname something that’s twice as long as the original nickname. It was just common sense. Plus the fact that, what kind of sorry excuse for a name is Finbird? But the response I chose was, “Oh …”
Aoife quickly glided between Posy-Kate and me. “That’s … not very interesting, Priscilla-Kathryn. Why don’t you show Finn to her room? You can help her unpack up there.”
“You mean the guest room?” said Posy-Kate.
Aoife flushed red.
“Because she’s a guest, isn’t she, Mother? Just a guest. You see, fish birds don’t stay in one place for long. One minute, they need the sea, the next, they need the air—such … nomadic creatures. Can never make up their little minds about what they want.”
My brain fogged over as Aoife looked from me to Posy-Kate and back to me. I wanted Posy-Kate to like me. But what was worse was that I had expected her to like me. Now I felt sunken, an old balloon tumbling down the burning streets of Belfast. Lonely, lonely, lonely.
“It’s fine,” I said. “I’ll find it on my own.”
And as I climbed the spiral staircase, I realized the smell. Blood. Stale, bitter, death-claimed blood.
Chapter 21
I FLED THE MANOR ten minutes ago. As soon as I’d dropped my suitcase on the lumpy, probably swan-feather-stuffed mattress of Aoife’s guest room, I ran.
Strange things happened as I wandered down the dusty roads of Starlight Valley. Door hinges creaked. Skittish eyes peered out from curtain cracks. Chickens and goats slunk out from behind their farmhouses. Men in jeans and women in flowered skirts tiptoed out of their homes, as if a grizzly bear were sleeping nearby. It wasn’t until I reached the woods that the village was in full swing, children chattering, mothers bustling, merchants flipping CLOSED signs to OPEN.
Distant fragments clattered in my ears:
“Getch yer omelets, getch yer beer, getch yer omelets, getch yer beer.”
“You wouldn’t believe the hat Margie wore to church yesterday.”
“Five dollars for a loaf? You thief! Two days ago they were four fifty.”
A few whispered of an expecting mother who was sick, and others whispered ghost stories of a witch they called the “Pegwitch,” but besides that, most were silent.
When I came to the edge of the forest of white-wooded aspens and deep emerald evergreens and sycamores just starting to turn golden for the fall, I opened my locket and pinched tight the single-petaled hawthorn flower. I brought it to my mouth, closed my eyes tight, and breathed these words:
“Don’t let me be lonely. Don’t let me be lonely. Don’t let me be lonely.”
My breath billowed the petal. The words felt like hurricane kisses on my lips, sad and angry and rumbling louder than thunderclouds. But when I opened my eyes, the valley was silent. The hustle-bustle had faded into the distance, and not even a breeze or a bumblebee grazed the trees. I glanced down to my locket and whispered to Margaret, Ed, and Oliver, “Fat chance,” then placed the petal back inside. But as I closed the locket, the most wondrous thing happened, and that was laughter.
Just laughter. But it danced like the first snow of winter or cherry blossoms on a mid-May wind. Or will-o’-the-wisps. That was it. The laugh danced like will-o’-the-wisps, blue-flame faeries over mist-laden bogs.
I spun thrice around, cool soil plinking down my socks, but no one was there. Perhaps I had imagined it. Perhaps I had gone mad. Perhaps someone was watching me. I should have felt scared, or at the least cautious, but no. There was not a drop of malice in that laugh, and it reverberated in my heart, and my heart—my heart was warm …
No. The locket was warm.
My breath quickened. I slipped behind an aspen with a carved heart encircling the letters J and B on its bark and clicked open the locket. Behind the hawthorn flower, Ed’s face was laugh struck, dimples deep set, and lanky arms slung over Oliver’s and Margaret’s shoulders. His teeth were crooked, half of them still baby teeth.
Something Darcy said to me rang in my ears:
“Mary says I’m wasting me time out here,” Darcy had said. “She says they en’t real, the faery.”
“Neither are stories,” I had told her, repeating Nuala’s words. “But that doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”
Curious, I thought, and closed the locket.
I continued on through the forest, leaving the weights of my new village and my new house and my new mother and my new sister at the edge of the woods. As I walked, however, I noticed something about the trees. They were named—just like my willow friends back in Donegal. Or, at least, they bore names on their bark. Most simply had carvings that said Joe or Daisy or Greg, but others held caterpillar-sized messages.
We’ve moved, Millie. Straight ahead and second house on the left, read one aspen tree, the message spinning ’round the entire circumference of the slender trunk.
Our darling Henry, we love you —Mom and Dad, read another.
The woods’ lonelies ran deep through roots, pulsing in the soles of my shoes. They tangled in the treetops, dusted my shoulders as I stooped beneath the low-hanging leaves. It seemed everyone in town had a tree message for someone. Everyone had lost someone. Everyone had a hole in their heart, and every message was a story. I could have listened. I could have unfolded each story like a paper fortune-teller, unwrapped their mysteries and spun gold from their melancholies.
I could have told stories.
I could have told stories—true or make-believe, it mattered not—I could have told stories. The sycamores and the evergreens, my audience; the aspens, my muse. But I didn’t. I read the tree messages for what they were and not a word more. Stories and I … well, we currently were not on pleasant terms.
Door’s unlocked, read one message. Door’s always unlocked —Jeff, Connie, and Rufus.
Where’d you go, Marlin?
I’ll be better —Taylor
Dog died. Got you a llama. Come meet her? —Arnold
I’ll be waiting, always —Stella
Forgive me, Ed —Nuala
I stopped short. Nuala. My vision filled with fog as if the greyman had found me yet again. I brushed my arms free of invisible spiders and reread the words on the aspen bark.
Nuala. I traced the words with my forefinger. It was Nuala’s handwriting, letters curving the same shape as her wrinkles. Albeit, a wobbly, wriggly version of it, but it was hers. Tears stung my eyes and I clenched my throat to stop them from falling. I knew I was alone—but something about the messages made me feel as though a thousand ghosts were watching me with bated breath.
Questions whizzed about in my head. What had Nuala done to Ed? Why was she sorry? Had Ed forgiven her, and had they kept in touch? Or did their friendship end bullet-quick, just as Nuala’s life had? And if their friendship split, had Margaret and Oliver drifted away from one or the other, or stayed close with both? What had become of them, these happy children in my locket? I bit my tongue. I should have asked her; why hadn’t I asked her? I’d never cared much about her life, never bothered to ask about her childhood or her voyage to America. Had she gone on a boat? Did they even have planes when she was a girl? I never asked where she’d learned her stories from or what her favorite subject in school was or what was the tallest mountain she ever climbed or how Grandpa Oliver proposed. I was selfish.
The sick feeling I had felt in the taxi settled into my stomach again. I blew a kiss to Nuala’s message, turned from the tree. I half considered tying my hair ribbon to a branch so I would be able to find the tree again, but no. I wouldn’t come back. The place made my skin prickle. I could have sworn I heard my bones rattle.
Yet still, there must have been tree spirits there, because my head pounded with the words: You belong here too. You are just like us. Just like us, just like us, just like us …
The Serendipity of Flightless Things Page 9