Daughter of the Storm

by Tina Callaghan

  But it had done something to her. Her wound burned and felt oddly like it was sizzling, still burning. She had been burnt by hogweed once and the blisters that rose and burst reminded her of this pain. A poison, but a burning one.

  Josie put a mug of tea into her cold hands.

  ‘Drink all that now. And swallow these down. You’ll feel better in a minute,’ Josie said.

  Rose looked at the strange tablets. Whatever they were, they were definitely not paracetamol, but she took them with a gulp of tea. The hot sweet liquid actually did make her feel a tiny bit better. At least it was normal.

  But then it came back to her again. She tried to focus on the kitchen, her daughter, Josie fussing about, tidying the table for something to do, but she couldn’t forget the horror of the teeth tearing her flesh, like a seagull ripping at a big fish. She kept hearing the dreadful sound of a lump of her body being pulled away. It was almost worse than the pain. She thought about the pain for a moment. It seemed to be flying away from her. She could still see it, but it was distant now.

  ‘You’ll be able to sleep now, Mam,’ Becky said.

  Rose touched her daughter’s cheek. She had been ready to die in her place and she wasn’t so sure that she hadn’t begun to, slowly but inexorably.

  ‘Josie,’ Rose said, ‘you didn’t see that thing.’ It was hard to get her voice to work. ‘The girl. But there was something wrong with Frank. Me and Becky saw him in the hospital. He was dead, but he wasn’t.’ She grabbed Josie’s hand. ‘I don’t want to go like him. Promise you won’t let me go that way. I can’t bear it.’

  ‘Shush now, Rose. You’ve had a terrible day. Let’s just put it behind us and get you to a nice fresh bed, eh?’

  ‘No, Josie,’ Becky said. ‘Listen to her. I saw that thing too. I saw it … I saw it biting her.’

  Josie took Becky’s free hand in hers, linking the three of them together.

  Rose’s vision was blurry, and when Josie moved she saw coloured jet trails left behind, but she had to say more before she went out entirely. She gripped their hands. When she spoke, she sounded drunk.

  ‘Josie, you know there’s something bad here. The men know it and they hide it from us.’

  Josie nodded, her face resigned. ‘They think they’re keeping their secrets,’ she said. ‘As if any man was ever able to keep a secret from his woman, even without telling. We didn’t know exactly what it was before, but I guess we do now.’

  Rose nodded, her head too heavy now. ‘If it’s got in me, you have to promise me to do something.’

  ‘Mam,’ Becky said, tears in her voice.

  Rose squeezed her hand and looked at Josie, feeling that her head was like a sunflower on a thin stalk, gradually bending, ready to fall.

  ‘How many more of those tablets do you have?’

  Josie looked at her seriously and Rose knew she had got through to her, even though she now looked like a prism of colour made by crying.

  ‘Enough,’ Josie said. ‘Enough.’

  Rose nodded and saw nothing more.

  Eighteen

  Like one, that on a lonesome road

  Doth walk in fear and dread,

  And having once turned round walks on,

  And turns no more his head;

  Because he knows, a frightful fiend

  Doth close behind him tread.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of

  the Ancient Mariner, 1798

  t had been the only thing Ed could think of to do. She had hurt and maybe killed Rose, and it was only a matter of time before she turned to Becky, who had her new baby to take care of, and to Lia. He couldn’t let anything happen to them. He suspected that he would never again feel about anyone the way he felt about Lia. For him, it was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, he knew. From the moment he had seen her when she asked him for directions, he had known. She was pretty and had gorgeous hair, but it wasn’t that. It was like there was a magnet inside each of them. It was the same instinct that drew a mother bird back to her chick in a colony of thousands without error. They were bonded. He couldn’t let anything happen to her.

  So he had run at the beautiful creature holding Rose. He was shouting but he wasn’t even aware of words. He ran at her, then swerved away. He had seen the way she looked at him. There was a curiosity in her eyes that made him think she would follow. The moment she did, he could feel her. Judging by the way she had moved to grab Rose, there was no way he could outrun her. Whatever she was, she could seize him at will but somehow he knew she wouldn’t straight away. He threw a wild look over his shoulder and saw Lia and Becky crouching beside Rose. Then the girl filled his vision.

  He turned and ran. He had nowhere to go, no one to run to. He wished his mother was still alive. He missed a sanctuary which was now lost to him forever. He wished that he had escaped the island and was taking photographs of birds in the hot, wet forests of the Amazon. He wished Lia could be with him.

  He wished and wished but time had frozen. All of the wishing and the Amazon birds had taken him only a short distance from danger with no hope of escape.

  She struck him in the back, bringing him down on his face in the cold damp ground, thick with springy moss. She turned him like a boneless puppet and sat astride his hips. His arms were rubbery and weak and didn’t want to obey him.

  She cocked her head to one side, then the other, watching him. Her hair was flying in the wind sweeping over them, but it didn’t tangle in her face. Instead, it floated above her as though they were beneath the surface of a rough sea. Like everything about her, it was white, a blazing white like the hottest fire, and yet she was cold. He could feel the cold of her wrapped around his hips. There was heat there too. He couldn’t tell if it was his or hers, or both of theirs. She was ice, but there was fire inside her.

  She moved on him, a small intimate shift that made him groan. She smiled then and leaned down over him. Her cold fingers touched his face and she kissed where her fingers had been. Her skin felt like the feathers of a dead gannet he had found on the beach. Soft, perfect, beautiful, lifeless. She kissed his mouth.

  Sensations raced through him. His mind held nothing but images of her, lithe, bare, like silk and lace, touching him everywhere. His body was likewise entranced, moving with her, helpless. She drew him into her and he went willingly.

  She sat up, leaned on his chest and put her hand on his throat. Her long nails scratched gently over his skin. He felt a sharp little pain and then she was bending over him and her lips were on him. She was drawing something out of him, some vital thing, and he couldn’t stop her. He didn’t want to stop her. He lay on the damp ground and stared up at sharp points of light in the night sky, wheeling with the slow turn of the galaxy as though his life had taken on some trace of eternity and he could now understand past, future, distance, and time. It was glorious and terrible. She was going to take his strength from him and give him something other.

  No. Down deep a voice spoke. No, it said. Don’t. Where is Lia? Where is my love? She is my life, my eternity. I won’t give it, I won’t.

  He felt her hesitate, and the exquisite pain faded. When it did, he suddenly thought of the chestnut of Lia’s hair, glinting red in sunlight, warm and full. He thought of her sweet face, her voice, the taste of her fruity lip gloss, the feel of her body against his.

  The beauty sat up and looked at him. He thought he saw a flicker of sadness cross her face, but it was quickly gone, replaced by her cold smile. She touched a finger to her lips and then to his throat. He swallowed and tears filled his eyes, turning her into a prismatic enigma. Then she was gone.

  Ed walked into the pub and saw Lia talking to Harry in an agitated way. She stopped in shock when she saw him, then flew into his arms. He buried his face in her neck and hair, smelling the good, clean smell of her. She wanted to pull away to look at him, but he held her for another few seconds, feeling like he might float away if she let him go. But Lia was impatient and wriggled to be free.

  ‘You
’re hurt. There’s blood on your neck. Did she … what happened?’

  ‘I think it’s OK. I just want a shower. Give me a few minutes?’

  She nodded, but he could see she was cross with worry and impatience. He suppressed a smile and went upstairs.

  In the shower, he let the hot water play on his neck and everywhere she had touched him. The skin on his throat was unmarked. He knew the blood was his, but the wound it had come from was healed. He closed his eyes and saw her touch her fingers to her lips and then to his throat. Somehow, she had torn him and then healed him. God, she was so beautiful, so cold. Even under the hot water, he could still feel the fierceness of her icy grip on him. And how good it had felt. He groaned in the privacy of the shower cubicle and scrubbed the heels of his hands into his eyes. He loved Lia. This other girl was a monster, but she had done something to him, or had almost done something, leaving it incomplete. He almost wished she had finished what she started because he was in limbo. He knew he was in love with Lia, but some part of him yearned for the other’s cold. He ached for it. For her.

  Hating himself, he scrubbed hard at his skin, trying to wash the feeling away. The tension only began to ease when he turned the shower to cold and let it hail painful needles into his body. By the time he got back downstairs, he felt like himself again. Almost.

  Nineteen

  All of the night was quite barred out except an owl’s cry,

  A most melancholy cry, shaken out long and clear

  upon the hill,

  No merry note, nor cause of merriment,

  But one telling me plain what I escaped

  And others could not, that night, as in I went.

  Edward Thomas, ‘The Owl’, c.1915

  Lia woke up, feeling as though she had been running all night. She had slipped into Ed’s room and into his arms. After the series of shocks and a strange night spent sleeping beside another person, a boy, she didn’t feel rested. Although they had lain together for company and comfort, the morning light brought different feelings.

  She felt like she had a bird trapped in her chest. At some point, they both must have felt too hot. Ed’s chest was bare and her own shirt was gone. She had on her bra and a cami-top. She was scared of whatever was out there, scared of being in bed with Ed, and her heart was banging so hard she felt sure he would hear it and wake up.

  He was lying on his left side, closest to the window. His shoulders and back looked a lot stronger than they looked in his clothes. Normally, he looked a little lanky, but she had been right when she watched him walking with Harry. She thought then that he would fill out into a strong man, but his loose shirts had hidden how much of a man he already was. Her skin burned at the thought that she was in bed, not with a boy, but with a man.

  He stirred and turned over. His hair was comically sticking up but his face was serious. One moment he was asleep; the next he was kissing her. She kissed him back, each of them trying to pull the other closer. She felt mindless, gloriously lost in him. As gentle as he seemed during the time they had spent together, he was different now. He was almost fierce. She felt his desire match her own, or outmatch it. He was strong enough to move her and, before she could think, he was on top of her and their bodies were pressed together.

  He kissed her neck, his breath on her skin making her shiver. He pressed his lips against her and nipped her. It sent a shot of excitement through her. Her body reacted and he made a rough noise deep in his throat. Then he rolled away and lay flat on his back.

  ‘Have you … been with someone before?’ he said, his voice funny.

  ‘No. Have you?’

  He nodded, not looking at her.

  ‘Ed? What is it? You’re making me feel weird.’

  He turned to look at her then, taking her hand.

  ‘It was pretty bad last night. I don’t think either of us is thinking straight,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t you want to be with me?’

  ‘I do. I really do. But it’s not the right time. I don’t think so anyway.’

  But she was ready, more than ready. She had said no to boys before and she knew that she had been right to. It was different with Ed. She wanted to be closer to him than she had ever been to anyone. The terror of the night made her want it all the more.

  At some point in the night she had awoken to see him standing at the window as though waiting for someone. She hadn’t been able to see his face, but something about the way he stood, the sigh he gave before coming back to bed, the cold of his skin against her, had dampened her desire then.

  But now she wanted him. She loved him. He loved her. She felt ready in lots of ways. She trusted him, even though she had only known him for a few days. Something in him spoke to its counterpart in her. It was meant to be. And she thought that he was wrong. They would have to get up soon and figure out what the hell had happened. Who knew what the day would bring? Maybe they wouldn’t even be here by the time night came again. She thought that they should seize these few moments. Plus the thought of being with him was thrilling and terrifying and right.

  But there was that something in his eyes. She didn’t doubt that they would be properly together, but he was holding back for a reason. Until that reason, whatever it happened to be, was gone, she would wait.

  So, she kissed him quickly and pulled her shirt on.

  ‘Come on then,’ she said lightly. ‘Let’s get up before Harry comes in with a shotgun or something.’

  He smiled but she slipped out before he could say anything, crossing the hall to her own room to shower and face herself in the mirror.

  Twenty

  Remember, my friend, that knowledge is stronger than memory, and we should not trust the weaker.

  Bram Stoker, Dracula, 1897

  Brendan looked down at the priest. He was ripped open. Brendan’s stomach churned at the sight of his bare white ribs and bile rose to the back of his throat. He waited to see if he was going to be sick, but it settled down again.

  He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. The rain was getting heavier and he could see the drops hopping off the man’s bones, hitting his staring eyes. The rain was making the island misty, so he whistled again and after a few minutes saw Andrew coming towards him, striding as though he owned every bit of the land he was walking on. Brendan looked around. This had been Dan’s land, so he supposed it actually was Andrew’s now. He had got it, by hook or by crook.

  Andrew stopped on the other side of the body, looking at it dispassionately.

  Andrew was the closest thing to a friend that Brendan had on the island but, as he studied him, he knew that he wouldn’t want to come up against him on any subject that mattered. Andrew wasn’t a big man, but there was something powerful about him. He walked with his legs spread, a colossus of a personality, though not a colossus of a man. Harry was a finer man by far, but Andrew was the kind of man that Brendan would always follow. He understood this about himself. Alone in his small house, he sometimes wished that he had made himself take a wife and had children. His was one of the old families, but he had no one to pass the name on to. The fact that he was attracted to men like Andrew didn’t help, but at times in the lonely nights he longed for a warm body to hold on to, just for company.

  Andrew looked up. ‘You didn’t find him,’ he said.

  Brendan almost spoke, before he realised what Andrew meant. He shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t find him.’

  ‘Take his legs.’

  Brendan did as he was told. Andrew caught the priest under the arms and together they carried him to the cliff. Brendan didn’t like the view he had of the torn body. The longer he looked, the more convinced he was that he could make out individual organs in the ruined, red cavities. If he looked long enough, it might appear that the destroyed heart would begin to beat again. He had once read a story about a heart buried under the floor by a murderer, beating still, calling attention to the crime and driving the culprit mad. He didn’t remember who wrote it, but it was such a horr
ible idea that it stayed with him. He often left music playing at night, so that he wouldn’t imagine the sound of the heart in the dark.

  But of course, he hadn’t killed this man, this priest. He hadn’t made him come out here in the night. Still, he had been a man and it didn’t do Bernard any good to look at the remains of him. He knew that he would be leaving the music on tonight.

  ‘On three,’ Andrew said.

  They swung the body between them, gaining momentum. Before they let him go, his guts swung out of his body, endless slippery loops of intestine. They let go and the crumpled figure flew out beyond the edge of the cliff, its innards flying behind like bloody pennants. It seemed to Brendan that the priest would fly forever, never dropping, but of course he did. He went down and they leaned carefully over to see where he had gone. The tide was in, covering the rocks, and the body was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘We shouldn’t have put Dan in the Hall,’ Brendan said. ‘What if she turns him, like she did with Frank? What if the priest comes back?’

  ‘The priest won’t, he’s too much of a mess. She just had her fun with him,’ Andrew said.

  ‘And what about Dan?’

  Andrew thought, his mouth twisted under his moustache. ‘We might have to rethink that one until we get control of her again. Fuck sake, Dan never stops being a bloody nuisance.’ He shook his head, sniffed and wiped his hands on a clump of grass. ‘Right. I’ve got work to get on with. See you later.’

  ‘Alright.’

  Andrew regarded Brendan doubtfully. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Don’t go doing anything stupid now.’

  ‘I won’t.’